


Nuclear Winter

by LothrilZul



Series: Winter'verse [1]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 3, Fallout 4
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Canon Het Relationship, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Falling In Love, Family Feels, Flashbacks, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Game Dialogues, Game Spoilers, Gen, Humor, Implied Sexual Content, Memory flashbacks, Mutual Pining, No Smut, On Hiatus, Pre-Relationship, Pre-war flashbacks, Sarcasm, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Swearing, Work In Progress, editing, in-game events, not dead yet
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-24
Updated: 2017-11-13
Packaged: 2018-12-06 09:03:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 39,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11597412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LothrilZul/pseuds/LothrilZul
Summary: At Cambridge Police Station, General Winter finds what and who she was searching for since emerging from Vault 111 months ago; a strong governing force and a reliable partner, who proves to be more than just her CO. Being a Railroad agent at the same time, she finds herself between two fronts and entering the Institute doesn't help either.Can she navigate through the chaos that is sure to entail over her head?Long story is long. I warned you.UPDATE 2018-10-05- I cut the chapters to the format I'll most likely use when I update. I don't dare to set a deadline for myself due to constantly failing it, but I am working on planning the story. I will not rest until I could vent this story out of me.The chapters with Titles are the updated ones (so far only one, but who knows when I'll upload), the ones that go by 'Chapter n' are the old ones. Hopefully it'll keep you from confusion. ^^UPDATE 2018-07-06 - THIS FIC IS NOT DEAD, I'm currently editing it.Planned update 2018 second quarter.





	1. War Never Changes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Winter recalls some memories as she prepares for her next mission._   
>  **Updated on 2018-02-28**

The first rays of sunlight stroked Winter’s face as she drowsily took in her surroundings, trying to cope with where she was. The noises around her were familiar. The low-pitched hum of her generators. The creaking of her wooden house. The distant splashing of the brook as the water played around the stones and old car wreck on the streamside. She was home, in Sanctuary. Comforting and familiar, but even after months, strange. 

It was warm and cozy under the covers, but she reluctantly rubbed the sleep from her eyes.

Sanctuary Hills wasn’t always like this. It was the colorful little birds greeting the sunrise with a choir of sweet melodies, cars emitting an almost inconceivable hum as they left or people discussing the price of fusion energy or the latest Shroud episode that she missed the most. There were no small children playing and laughing sweetly on the nearby playground anymore and no one remembered these details from before the War -- no one but her.

The day when the bombs fell irreversibly changed the World. Winter no longer sought the songbirds, nor liked to listen to their tormented laments. The cars rusted away on roadsides, mere shells of their former glory buried under debris and vegetation. A makeshift shack, some mutfruit on their plate and a turret watching their back was enough to make someone happy. People weren’t picky anymore, unleashing the world’s nuclear arsenal in a frenzy ensured that.

She stood sighing, stretching her aching muscles and thinking she definitely needed a new mattress. Frowning at the probability to actually find one, she made the bed.

Like every morning, her first trip led her to Shaun’s room. The small, windowless premise wasn’t perfect, but she was proud of her work. By wasteland standards, the room was tidy and safe, some would say overkill. It had a functioning ceiling fan and some decent furniture arranged neatly. Rocket ships, kittens and the colour blue dominated the room.

She had hauled a green trunk chest up from Concord and filled it with all kind of toys for him. It was quite a collection, actually. Wooden cars and toy trucks, some of them still with a decent amount of paint. Wooden blocks with letters, she only needed a 'U’ to be able to spell his name. Some balls, a rubber alien and even a Blast Radius board game in a nice condition. It was scandalously expensive before the war, now she only had to reach out for it laying around in the supermarket. Well, maybe she had to shoot the distorted cashier too, but only because she left no other choice. She figured those people, long since gone, would have been grateful for her ending their misery. She knew if she had the choice, she wouldn’t want to live like that either.

She blinked in surprise at the sudden noise of Shaun’s old rattle scattering away as she rummaged through the contents of the trunk. It landed on a Vault-Tec promotional brochure, ‘You are SPECIAL!’, it announced with big, colourful letters. She brushed the rattle away and picked the booklet up and frowned, pondering if she really needed it, since Vault-Tec brought no joy to her life. A few seconds later she let it fall back, even if Shaun was reading Tesla Science and the Surgical Journal now, she didn’t want to just throw it out.

Of course, before the war, they bought everything for him – even more than one infant needed. She found some of those items buried beneath debris and overgrown weeds and cherished them, as the last reminders of her family long gone. Her son hadn’t seen this room yet. And Nate… he never will…

Memories of the old world engulfed her. 

 

It was a particularly hot summer day in the quiet suburb called Sanctuary Hills. Theresa waved to Nate’s parents one last time as they got into their Corvega. This was their last visit before the baby arrived. At least she hoped it was the last time. She loved her father-in-law, and didn’t mind her mother-in-law around either, but she was tired. She really appreciated their help, but the only thing she really needed was some undisturbed sleep.

Whenever she wanted it.

Theresa was near terminus, and as she thought about her unborn child… her  _ son _ , she placed her hand on her abdomen, hoping he would feel her caress. She was sure the baby was a boy, while Nate seemed to be convinced  t he opposite. He even painted the crib a light shade of rose. He’d have to repaint it soon. For  _ him _ . Still, she wasn’t sure about the name though. Nate was uncooperative when it came to boy names. He was daydreaming with his cherished names; Amatha and Lisa. 

As their car pulled out, Theresa headed back to the house to collapse on the sofa. She needed a nap.  _ Now. _ Nate followed and closed the door behind him.

“Would you be so kind to open the terrace door? I forgot. Only that one has bug-screen,” she asked her husband since she was already plopped on the couch. It wasn’t as if getting up was an easy chore. “It’s like a smelter in here. You should check the thermostat.”

“Sure thing”, he offered, “anything for Princess Lisa and Her Majesty ’s Mothership Theresa.” Nate was well aware that for a similar joke he would face serious consequences (like being chased around the house until she could smack him several times) from a non-pregnant Theresa. Unfortunately, the current one was unable to do such things so he carefully remained out of hand's reach. She needed a backup plan.

“Oh yeah?” Theresa said while searching for something to throw at Nate. 

She found an oven mitt. “Incoming!” It was a gift from her in-laws, recently unpacked and just laying on the sofa, until now.

Except he evaded her airstrike, damn his military reflexes. Well, he got off cheaply. For now. Perhaps luck for him, he already picked it up and headed for the laundry. His orderliness was an extenuating circumstance. Hell yeah, he was a good husband. Maybe a little too soft, but a good man. 

 

Nate. She really missed Nathaniel. Would the void within her ever heal?

She wasn’t longing after him anymore, but it was still painful to think about him. The man was pure kindness, disguised as a Cambridge patrolman. Although he was twelve years older than her, she never felt the age gap. He was a grown up child. She closed her eyes, trying to evoke his almost black eyes and his playful smile she so adored, but she failed. Too much time had passed since he died. Since he was  _ murdered _ .

_ Focus, hon. _

She was able to recall his tone, at least. Winter received a holotape recording from Codsworth when she emerged from the Vault. Nate recorded it few days prior the bombs and she listened to it countless times. Not only did it remind her there was a reason to keep fighting in this godforsaken wasteland, but it was the last tangible reminder that her husband ever lived. She had no photos, no clothes, nothing else left of him, only his wedding ring and his tape. No one else remembered him, just she and Codsworth and to be honest, she was surprised the robot was still in one piece. 

General Atomics guaranteed lifetime warranty for its robots, sure, but the centuries had their toll on Codsworth. His plating rusted and his mood suffered a great deal from the solitary centuries but it was comforting to know that at least he remembered Nate and Shaun too.

How would things be if Nate were still around? His military background would have been a hell of an advantage in this world, that was for sure.

She didn’t realize when she’d closed the trunk or how long she had been staring at the white star painted on it. Too long she supposed and left Shaun’s bedroom, to stare out the window. Their old house was just across the street, now functioning as Sanctuary’s hospital and drug store. Codsworth was hovering near a dried hedge out of habit, the poor plant hadn’t changed in ages. 

She couldn’t stomach living there anymore, but she wasn’t ready to let everything go either, so she compromised. As her gaze met the billboard of Vault-Tec on the hilltop, the tidal wave of emotion swept her away.

 

Theresa was glad the previous buyer made up their mind and they were able to buy  _ this  _ house before their son was born. It was the ‘House of Tomorrow’ and had all the modern amenities one could need. It wasn’t too big, neither too small, just the right size. She never bumped her pinky into the furniture nor had to walk too much between two rooms. 

But it wasn’t the size alone that was perfect. Sanctuary Hills lived up to its name. 

It was a remedy after the rush-hour of downtown Boston where she spent her last years. Until now. This was the perfect place to settle down. To raise a kid. Or more than one. She could imagine herself getting old here. The trees and the stream gave off a serene atmosphere. In fact, the whole suburb was located on an island, with only a historical bridge leading in and out. There was no heavy traffic, at least not until Vault-Tec started to construct their new vault nearby. She had ambivalent feelings about it; she felt blessed by the fact that it was close, but she didn’t like the vibes it caused. The people were nervous about the impending nuclear holocaust since construction began. 

For Theresa, the possibility of total nuclear annihilation was among the last things she wanted to think about while expecting a baby.

She was standing in the doorway of the laundry watching Nate read the manual of the Mister Handy unit his parents brought earlier the day. Not that it required much assembly anyway. The trickiest part was to get it out of the box without scratching the polished metal. Then they had to give it some fuel and turn it on, select a personality and voilà, they had a lifetime servant. And maid. And gardener. And baby-sitter. And whatever the heck they needed. Theresa wasn’t entirely sure that they really needed the robot, but she was willing to give it a try. 

“Well, that’s it. It has three personality modes and three voice patterns,” Nate announced. “We will be able to choose after it’s on,” he said with his finger already on the power button.

“Okay, turn it on,” she replied with an eager smile.

The robot’s thrusters instantly turned on, levitating the Mr. Handy a meter above ground. It hovered there for a few seconds, then a panel opened and an eye emerged from its round body.

“Please, in order to determine the unit’s personality and voice; listen to this holotape,” a processed voice said and Theresa hoped there would be much more sophisticated variations to choose from. They listened to the provided samples coming from the robot’s speakers. 

“I liked the British accent,” Nate remarked after the last sample.

“Yeah, me too! You know, technically American English is the accent, while British was the original,” Theresa replied to which Nate only frowned. “And I think I liked the second personality.”

“I was somehow sure about that, Hon,” Nate smiled, as he stood up and kissed her.

“Good evening Mr. and Mrs…?” the Mister Handy unit started and promptly stopped, waiting for input.

“Irwin,” Nate replied. “I’m Nathaniel, and she’s my wife Theresa.” 

“Very well, sir!” They were not aware when his second and third eyes came out of their sockets, but now three big eyes scanned them restlessly. It was a sight they needed to adjust to. “And I will be called…?”

Theresa hadn’t thought about it yet, and judging by Nate’s silence neither did he. She was clueless. Her head was still full of work-related things. Heavy tomes,  _ codex _ es came to her mind, things that made her job easier. Some of these  _ worth _ their price, others were completely useless. The Mr. Handy adjusted its eyes as it waited for input and Nate raised his heavy eyebrows, urging her to say something.

“Erm, it could be,” she hesitated for a moment, “Codsworth, if you like?” She bluffed and made up a name on the go.

“I like it Mrs. Irwin,” he addressed her with the unmatched politeness of a servant. She was sure that it would have been equally happy if she named it  _ Benedict Toastington _ .

“Please, just call me Mum,” she laughed, “I’ll be a mother soon,” she stroked her belly. “I need to get used to it,” she added, more to herself then to Codsworth.

Three irises narrowed and opened as he processed what she said. “I see. As you wish, Mum!”

“Mum?” Nate had a hard time suppressing his laughter, but he wanted to get to his point anyway. “Codsworth, please don’t call me  _ Dad _ , unless if it will be about my little daughter.  _ Sir _ , or Nate will do fine.”

“Aye, sir!” Codsworth registered the order.

“You mean your son?” Theresa teased him with her motherly instincts.

Nate shook his head and released Theresa from his arms with a grin. “Come, Codsworth, I’ll show you the house. This is the laundry, and if you are all right with that this will be your… erm… room when you don’t need to do anything or… you know, you want to… rest?”

“Yes, I suppose this is the best place for a domestic robot after all,” the robot agreed and quickly looked around in the utility room. It wasn’t hard with three eyes.

“Glad we are on the same page,” Nate said relieved. “Come with me.”

Theresa let them out and headed to the bedroom and quickly fell asleep listening to Nate’s tour around the house.

 

She wore his wedding ring as an amulet and clutched it tightly. 

Under the billboard, deep inside the bowels of earth, lain the cursed Vault 111. Winter still couldn’t decide if it was luck or irony of fate that her family was permitted into the vault.

Why couldn’t they pick Vault 81, instead? Before moving to Sanctuary, they lived in the Fens, a ten minute walk from the Chestnut Hillock Reservoir.

Life under Overseer Olivette would have been the advertised, ideal life. She would have had a full long life with Nate, they would have seen Shaun grow up and maybe start his own family…

Should they be so lucky. Instead, Vault-Tec ruined her life. She lost everything and everyone down there. She became a faceless subject of a wicked experiment. Not more than a number in a statistics book. As she thought about it now, she should’ve known.

 

After the explosions, As they were ushered forth, Theresa’s unease grew. She saw no recreational or residential areas in the vault on their way in and it was goddamn cold down there. 

She didn’t like it one bit.

Reflecting her chaotic emotional state, Shaun began to cry in her hold and she couldn't soothe him no matter how she tried, so Nate took him. In a matter of minutes, Shaun had calmed and began to doze off.

They were instructed to step into the pods, everyone to a different one. If it was really about decontamination, why not get it over one after another? It was fishy, how come she didn't see it back then? Nate stepped to his pod with Shaun and then it was too late the lid closed and all she could do was to wave and nervously smile back.

Minutes and centuries later, from her confinement she witnessed the murder of her husband and the kidnapping of her son and she couldn’t do anything to stop it.

Then she fell out of her pod. The air reeked of decomposing corpses. She opened up Nate’s pod but he was beyond saving. He was cold and hard as ice and when she tried to take his wedding ring with her as a keepsake, his finger remained in her hands. She stared numbly at it. What is one supposed to do with a severed finger? She tucked it in his pocket and backed away in horror, clutching his ring to her chest. She had to get out of there…

 

Winter never returned to visit Nate in his icy grave. When she had to relive the scene in the Memory Den, from Kellogg’s viewpoint, she didn’t dare to look at him. Watching him die once was more than enough.

She tore her gaze from the billboard and sighed. This all happened more than six months ago, but almost everything around here caused her to relive the past. Good thing she was about to depart soon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for your amazing support and thoughtful additions, and most importantly for beta-reading, Purple_Martin! Without you, this chapter couldn't be here in this form.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **This is an old, unedited chapter. I'll gradually update and split the chapters as I get thought them. ******

A subtle beep of her Pip-Boy let her know it picked up a radio signal. Strange, this area just south of Lexington was usually quiet on all frequencies. She found the signal in the military frequency range and tuned onto it.

A pleading voice of a woman came out of the speakers.

“ _...casualties and we're running low on supplies. We're requesting support or evac from our position at Cambridge Police Station._ ” The location was in their way, she remembered that several month ago she visited the police department, hoping to find some ammo. The message started over, it was set to repeat after ending. “ _Automated message repeating… This is Scribe Haylen of Reconnaissance Squad Gladius to any unit in transmission range. Authorization Arx. Ferrum. Nine. Five. Our unit has sustained casualties and we're running low on supplies…_ ”

She listened to the whole message twice, then turned off the radio.

“We need to help,” she stated the obvious to Preston.

“I agree. I hope we won’t be late,” he said with a little bit of jitters in his voice. “Sounds like it’s been on for a while.” She was afraid that he was right. There might be no one alive there.

“Only that this time, I don’t plan to walk through College Square again,” she remarked jokingly, remembering her last time going there. She was so overwhelmed by her memories of the place, that she didn’t realize the ferals until there were half a dozen attacking her at once. She only made it out alive because Preston had his safety off. He always had.

“Yeah, that would be great,” he grinned with agreement. “What’s a scribe, huh?” He was clueless about it.

“I don’t know, we’ll ask them if we get there.” They hastened as much as it was possible without alerting anyone to their presence.

Winter knew Cambridge very well. She spent some of best years of her life there, when she studied for her law degree. She knew which alleyways were closed by walls or fences or where to take a shortcut between two places. They took a route which was circling around the town. Once they were close enough to the police station, they heard the sound of laser weapons firing. At least someone was still there.

“This way,” she signalled Preston to follow her in a narrow alley. They were definitely close to the action. She took a left turn and run up some stairs. She navigated well, as they found themselves inside the semicircle palisade with which the police station was surrounded. It was most likely US Army handiwork, but it was reinforced since the last time she saw it. The radroaches that previously inhabited the police station cared little about the defenses and tidying up, but the current residents did.

Winter took a quick headcount. One man up the palisade, another one on the ground in power armor, and a woman defending a wounded man atop the stairs. She had little to do, as the other two did a good job of holding back the hostiles. But there were only four of them against the countless ferals. She saw at least fifteen of them, most of them swarming on or around the palisade, or lying dead around the power armored man. There was something familiar in their uniform, but Winter couldn’t tell what.

With Winter and Preston’s arrival, the odds got slightly better, as now they were six instead of four.

“Civilian in the perimeter! Check your fire!” It was definitely coming from the heavy in the middle, who looked like their leader.

Winter quickly decided who to support and ran up to the palisade which was overrun by the ghouls. Preston took a good vantage point up the stairs, behind a barricade near the woman and the wounded one. His laser musket required some time to charge before firing by cranking it, but once he was able to shoot, the damage was devastating. Winter had to fight her way until the man trapped between the ferals. She picked them off one by one with her pistol, a few bullets each. She liked her sniper rifle better, but in close quarters it wasn’t viable.

“Aaaargh,” the man roared with pain as the ferals ripped open his abdomen. Winter had to reload at the worst possible time, and while she fumbled with the magazine, one of the ferals spotted her and decided to dash at her. She tried to retreat but she fell over to her back, landing on some corpses. She managed to load the clip but before she could aim, she saw a red flash and the feral landed on her. She jerked her legs away from it, but it was dead already. She aimed at the last ghoul tearing the poor man’s bowels and killed it with a headshot. She checked her back but it was clear, so she crawled up to wounded man. He was unconscious and his wounds seemed incompatible with life, but she decided to use a stimpak on him anyway. She didn’t believe he would make it to the next day, though. She looked around to see how the fight was. She just saw a dozen more ghouls swarming from college square.

“More of them coming,” she yelled down to alert the others. She aimed and shot, and she managed to shoot three of them before even reaching the palisade. The laser rifles and the laser musket did short job of the remaining ones afterwards. A few minutes later the ghouls were either lying around dead or were turned into smoking ash piles. Winter wouldn’t want to move the injured man alone, but she checked his pulse. It was very weak, but stable at the moment. He still had some blood which didn’t escape his veins. She spotted a dog tag around his neck and inspected it. His name was Keane. And she found the dog tag _very_ familiar.

She quickly searched through the pockets of the ghouls she killed and found some cutlery and a pocket watch on them. One of them even had a sealed tube of wonderglue. That was hell of an adhesive, still sticking after two hundred years.

She glanced over the perimeter again, to see if there was more to come, but it looked the entire ghoul population of Cambridge was alerted and decided to join the fray already.

Winter took off her goggles and wiped her forehead before descending from the perimeter to loot the intact ghouls in the courtyard, but she had no inclination to plow through the burning ash piles. She turned around after she finished with the last one, only to find herself opposed the chest piece of a power armor. She looked up to the fierce brown eyes and stepped back to mitigate the awkwardness of the situation.

“Hi!” She said lightheartedly, like she was just about to ask the time from him.

“We appreciate the assistance, civilian,” he nodded approvingly before hardening his features. “But what's your business here?” He almost sounded like he caught a burglar in his home during the night. For a moment Winter considered to hand over the findings, but he didn’t seem a scavenger type to her.

“Pest exterminator,” Winter joked and pointed to the bodies laying around. “I heard you had a feral problem.” She kept five feet distance from the man for sure. “I’m afraid Mr. Keane won’t make it,” she pointed to the unconscious man on the palisade.

“Haylen?” he called for the woman, who was binding the wounds of the other injured soldier.

“I’ll be there in a moment, sir,” she replied to him dutifully so he turned back to Winter sternly.

“Evading my questions is a surefire way of getting yourself ejected from the compound.” She glanced to Preston, who was following the conversation and slowly started to descend the stairs. He was used to her manners, but this heavy was starting to lose his patience.

“I could ask the same from you. I can’t remember to have seen this… sigil before,” she pointed at the symbol at his chestpiece.

“If you want to remain in our compound, I suggest you answer my question first.” He stepped closer intimidating, but she swiftly stepped aside, towards Preston. “Are you from a local settlement?” he persevered, irritated by the fact that she wasn’t scared of him.

The only thing Winter knew about this group is that she found them familiar somehow and she wanted to find out why. “Do all these questions really matter? After all, I helped you fight those ferals.” _That’s all that should have matter, big guy._

The man shook his head reproachfully and sighed. “This would be much easier for both of us if you'd cooperate. Now, where are you from?” The man was stubborn.

A quick thought ran through her mind to bore him to death with the details of her childhood village in the Alps, but she rejected the idea. “You wouldn’t believe me if I’d say.” Seeing the doubt in the brown eyes, she added, “fine. You want a short or a long answer then?”

“I’d prefer the short one,” he scowled at her impatiently.

Winter recollected the milestones of her life and started to enumerate them, counting on her fingers. “I was born in Europe, moved to California when I was a little girl, then to Cambridge to study and I settled down in Boston with my husband.” She was pointing at her ring finger by the time she mentioned Nate and she wondered if it was accidental or not. Her interrogator looked at Preston for a moment with a question on his face, so Winter added, “no, he’s not him,” which made Preston to scowl. She fiddled with her wedding ring she was still wearing. “He died. But that’s a long story.” She continued her list, by pointing at her little finger. “Before my son born, we moved to a suburb north of here.”

“You’re right, I don’t believe you,” he said menacingly.

“I don’t blame you,” Winter sighed. She just met this man, she couldn’t expect him to believe her story. Hell, there were times she couldn’t believe it either. This soldier was interested in the present and she figured she should start to live in it too. Nothing will bring back the world as is was two hundred years ago. “I’m from Sanctuary Hills, on the other side of Concord,” she pointed into the direction from she just arrived. “But I came from Vault 111 before that.” She held her left arm up to show him her Pip-Boy to support her claim. The man in the power armor nodded, finally.

The woman finished tending the first injury and headed to see Keane. They both followed her by their eyes as she went down one stairs and up the other, taking the stairs two at a time.

“Most people wouldn't admit to such a thing.” His tension eased a little, but he was still far from friendly. “I appreciate your honesty. If I appear suspicious, it's because our mission here has been difficult. Since the moment we arrived in the Commonwealth, we've been constantly under fire. If you want to continue pitching in, we could use an extra gun on our side.” That almost sound like an invitation, a desperate one at that.

“All right. My name is Winter, I’m the General of the Commonwealth Minutemen. I picked up your distress signal on my radio and came to help, because that’s what we do.” She nodded towards Preston at the word ‘ _we_ ’ and he straightened himself proudly. “He’s Preston Garvey, my right hand.”

“General?” The heavy furrowed his brows skeptically. “I can’t see your army anywhere.” It was hard to tell that he was actually joking and Preston failed to perceive the signs in his mimics, so he started to explain.

“We were decimated after the Quincy Massacre… But with the General’s help we are starting to get back to it.” It was Winter’s turn to feel proud of herself, but she became flushed at the same time. It was actually Preston, who did the lion’s share of the work by keeping contact with the forces and everything necessary. “There was an old pre-war idea, to " _Protect the people at a minute's notice_." That’s what we do. When the locals need help, they seek us and we always do what we--”, but his monologue was cut by an angry growl of Haylen.

“Damn it Keane, don’t you dare to die on me!” They heard her muttering profanities under her nose. “Okay, that’s better… keep it up,” she mumbled. “He’s losing too much blood, sir,” she spoke up, reporting the situation to Winter’s conversation partner. “He won’t make it without a proper surgery,” she remarked with profession, but not without sorrowness. “I tried my best to stabilize him, but we’ll need to get him in soon,” she summarized.

“Acknowledged, Haylen,” the commander replied gloomily. “Take Rhys and Keane inside and bind their wounds,” he instructed the medic.

“Yes, sir,” she replied, then tucked her arm under Keane’ armpit to lift him up. Preston decided to help her. They hauled him up the stairs.

“Our situation might appear dire, but I've led my men through worse,” he stated as he held the door open for them. Preston soon returned without Haylen.

“Rhys, once you're on your feet, I want you to make certain that the perimeter is secure,” he ordered him.

“I'm on it,” he said, though it was clear that simply standing took a lot of effort from his part for now.

“I want to help but I don't like the secrecy. Who are you? Really?” These people seemed good at heart and Winter was curious who they were by now.

“Seems more than reasonable,” Preston supported her, “if you really want our help.”

Haylen appeared in the door again and tucked her arm under the other man’s armpit. He was in much better condition than Keane. “Alright big guy, let's go,” the medic teased him when as she helped him totter into the police station.

“Yeah, yeah... I'm comin',” he grumbled. He was limping to his left leg, but was able to hold some of his own weight.

They watched as they slowly climbed up the stairs, step-by-step.

“So? ”Winter cleared her throat and urged him to answer.

“Very well,” the power armored man yielded once his men were in safety. “I'm Paladin Danse, Brotherhood of Steel. My men are Scribe Haylen, Knight Keane and Knight Rhys. We're on recon duty, but our supplies are running low. I've been trying to send a distress call to my superiors, but the signal's too weak to reach them.” As he was speaking, the realization hit Winter. The T-60 power armor, their uniforms, the tags and the strange rank system all assembled into the bigger picture. She saw soldiers like this before, but they were all dead. She had a little package consisting of their dog tags and tapes. She reached into her shoulder bag to see if it was still in there.

“Sir, if I may?” Haylen turned her head halfway back.

“Proceed, Haylen,” he granted her permission to speak.

“I've modified the radio tower on the roof of the police station, but I'm afraid it just isn't enough. What we need is something that will boost the signal.” Preston stepped back to look up to the radio mentioned and for some reason, he smiled. After a moment, Winter realized that they were on a mission to secure a radio transmitter for themselves too.

Paladin Danse shook her up from her thoughts. “Our target is ArcJet Systems, and it contains the technology we need... the Deep Range Transmitter. We infiltrate the facility, secure the transmitter and bring it back here. So, what do you say? You willing to lend the Brotherhood of Steel a hand?”

Winter wanted to give a chance to this Brotherhood, because there was something likeable in these soldiers, but before she could spoke, Preston interrupted. “General, we need to focus on taking the Castle back.”

“I know, Preston,” she assured him that she was full aware of the situation, then turned to the Brotherhood Paladin. “Look, we’re on a mission already, but once I finished there I’ll check back and see if I can help you.” They were only four, two of them wounded, and the woman looked like a medic not a foot soldier. If it wasn’t for Preston and the Castle, Winter would already say ‘yes’ without hesitation.

“The Brotherhood of Steel would appreciate your assistance,” he stated ceremoniously. She saw that his tension eased, or at least he didn’t look like he was about to throw them out anymore.

“She won’t come back,” she heard a coughing voice coming from the wounded man.

“We’ll see, Rhys,” the commander rebuked him. “You’ll need some days to recover. I don’t plan on splitting the team, neither to go solo.” Rhys understood because he didn’t object.

“All right, General, head inside,” the paladin turned back to Winter, “I’d like to continue this conversation inside.”

“Come, Preston, let’s see if they can spare some ammo for us,” Winter patted on Preston’s back and lept through the door held open by the paladin. Preston hesitantly followed her order. Once everyone was inside, the paladin closed the double blue doors.

“If you don’t mind, I’d lock the door while I check my suit,” he asked for their permission.

“Of course Paladin, you’re at home and we are only your guests,” Winter nodded.

“I appreciate it,” he replied as he locked the blue doors.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **This is an old, unedited chapter. I'll gradually update and split the chapters as I get thought them.**  
>  (Not much to see here, I just cut these chapters up to more digestible lengths, preparing for the time I'll actually update the text.)

Winter looked around in the premise, it was much more organized than it was under the radroaches reign, but it was nowhere near to how it looked before the War. She remembered that too well.

If there was one thing that didn’t change; the facility was radiating the atmosphere of safety. Being at the police station was like coming home for her, and with living people around she felt the echoes of the vibrant life which was describing the place before the War. People back then came here for help, and it was inconceivable that now she was the one who came to help the people here.

The furniture was all lined up against the walls, and there were some terminals set up here and there. The rubble was hoarded into an adjacent room and the floor was swept clean. The soldiers did everything they could to make the place habitable, but they had to sleep in bedrolls, because these were camp conditions.

She checked the spot where she shot one of those giant, disgusting insects earlier and the bullet holes were of course still there, but the entrails of the radroach were washed off. “Sorry about the radroach mess, I didn’t have bug spray on me,” she joked, but she only got confused looks in response. “I had to shoot them,” she explained, pointing to the holes in the wall. Awkward silence fell onto the room.

“You vault dwellers are sure strange people,” Danse remarked, then proceeded to the room on the left and she heard the hissing of the armor frame opening up.

Preston leaned to a wall, checking his musket. Winter went up to the reception desk to rest her elbow on it. She did it out of habit, before she realized the reason, but quickly tried to shoo the thought. It was not the time to think about him. Rhys was sitting on a bedroll, leaning to the wall. Haylen tried to control Keane’s bleeding, but moving him inside made things worse. She shook her head frantically.

“So you gonna patch me up or what?” Rhys tried to snap her out of her desperate fight against Keane’s bleeding.

She didn’t stop, just looked at him for a second. “I don't know, your prognosis looks pretty grim,” she joked. Winter was glad that someone else was coping with hard situations the way she did. “Might be more humane to just take you out back and shoot you,” she suggested to Rhys, but from the state of the things, Winter believed she said it about Keane, instead.

“You're all heart, doc,” Rhys grimaced and Haylen let a short laugh to burst out of her.

“You will survive. Keane most likely won’t,” she added sadly. “I’ll wrap you in new bandages after I finished here.” She wasn’t the type to just leave a patient to die, Winter presumed.

Paladin Danse returned to the room in the same orange uniform she saw on Rhys. He looked much shorter without the power armor, but was still taller than her. He pulled off his hood and scratched his neck as he passed her to sit on a chair. He had inches of long, thick dark hair, which reminded her to Nate’s long raven locks. He sat down and rubbed his eyes, then pinched the bridge of his nose as he slowly exhaled.

“Headache, sir?” Haylen was a true medic, paying attention to more than one patient at a time.

“Nothing serious, Haylen,” he tried to reassure her, but she was intractable.

“You need to rest, Danse,” she pleaded him, and Winter noticed it was the first time she called him anything else than “sir”. Seeing his disagreement she added, “that’s an order, sir.”

“I’m  _fine_ , Haylen,” he slightly raised his voice. Haylen shook her head disapprovingly, but understood that there’s no room for contradiction.

Winter almost felt like an intruder, seeing them lowering their guards in the safety of their base and letting her see nuances that weren’t her business. Things that would prove fatal if she weren’t who she was saying. It was clearly a risk from the Paladin to let them in and Winter appreciated his trust. She cleared her throat to attract their attention to her.

“Who are the Brotherhood of Steel?” She wanted to learn more about their organization. It was definitely good to see living members of the group for a change.

“Our order seeks to understand the nature of technology. It's power. It's meaning to us as humans.” Winter was relieved to know that there were organizations that still dealt with preservation of technology. “And we fight to secure that power from those who would abuse it.” Danse spoke with the certitude of a religious fanatic. Of course, after the War, everything was exaggerated, so she wasn’t surprised by his enthusiasm at all, it was still better than apathy.

“How did mankind abuse technology?” Winter asked, though she already saw tremendous atrocities around the Commonwealth, all originating from her time.

“Before the Great War, science and technology became more of a burden than a benefit.” Now that he wasn’t interrogating her anymore, his voice was much pleasurable to listen to, even though the topic wasn’t a pleasing one. “The atom bomb, bio-engineered plagues and FEV are clear examples of the horrors that technological advancement had wrought. We're here to make sure that never happens again.” She knew better than almost anyone else what the nuclear warheads were capable of. Standing on the vault elevator platform, seeing the first mushroom cloud emerging above southwest Boston was still a fresh memory in her mind. She didn’t knew what the other two he mentioned were, but it was good to know that someone decided to stand guard above mankind.

“Your cause seems noble,” she nodded admiringly.

Paladin Danse noticed that they were still standing, so he stood up and hauled a table away from the wall. “I'm pleased that you agree,” he said as he offered her a chair what she accepted. Preston grabbed a chair too and sit down next to her. Danse settled down on the other side of the table. “There are very few outside the Brotherhood who appreciate the gravity of the situation we're facing as a species.” She couldn’t decide that it was his personal belief or part of his job description to say that, but she agreed with him nevertheless. She decided it was time to show him the package.

“I think you should see this,” she placed the small orange packet on the table in front of the Paladin.

“What’s this…?” he asked surprised. He recognized the uniform in a single glance and furrowed his brows, trying to understand the situation. As he unfolded it to inspect its contents, Winter began to explain how she acquired the holotapes and the holotags.

“I picked up a distress signal near Malden a few months ago and I found some fallen soldiers in a ruined house. Of course I didn’t know they were Brotherhood back then,” she recalled her memories. “The site was a mess. A bunch of destroyed power armors laying around in a blast crater, surrounded by a lot of corpses. I’d say they were dead for a couple of years. I found a holotape and some tags on them.”

“Artemis?” Haylen interrupted curiously.

“Unfortunately, yes,” Danse said with a grave voice and read the names from the tags out loud. “Knight Varham. Knight Morgan. Knight Prescott. Knight Ryder. And Knight Astlin.” They took a moment of silence. “What happened to them?” Danse inquired.

She picked up a holotape and played it on her Pip-Boy instead of explaining. The sounds of a group struggling filled the room.  _“...ambushed on the road. We're outnumbered five to one!” “Core's down to 5%!” “We'll have to scuttle the armor. We can't let them have it-” “Varham!” “Dammit! Astlin, set the self-destructs! Faris, fall back! We'll head for the old military base, then try to make it to our holdout. The code will be our callsign. All right, move! Move! Move!”_

Winter ejected the tape in the silent which fell to the room. She didn’t exactly understood what happened, but they might did. It must have been difficult for them to hear this.

“They did what they had to do,” Danse remarked sorrowfully. “Our technology must be protected, no matter the cost.”

“That sounds a little cruel,” Preston interjaculate to which he got no answer.

“I tracked down Astlin’s trail, she was dead too. The place was overrun by ferals.” Winter picked up the other holotape and hit play. The woman from the previous tape now spoke with pain.  _“Knight Tara Astlin. Brotherhood of Steel Recon Team 429-Alpha. Serial number 3431. It's been three hours since I set my distress pulser. There's been no word from the Paladin or Faris. Their objective was a satellite array on the coast. They may be out of range. My orders were to hold this position at all costs. The entire site has been overrun. The door won't last much longer. Paladin Brandis, sir. It's been an honor, sir.”_

“Astlin.” Danse said to himself. “She was in my company once. Best marksman I ever saw. Damn it,” he cursed under his breath.

“I tracked down Brandis and Faris,” Winter continued, “but the location was swarming with super mutants, so I stayed away.” Winter remembered the imposant satellite array on the coast, most of the super mutants there had rocket launchers and she valued her life more than trying to get in.

“Thank you for informing me about your findings,” Danse said with a grateful, but somber voice. “The Brotherhood will honor their memory.”

“Don’t you want to investigate further?” Winter inquired.

“I do,” he sighed, “and I have orders to do so as well.” He paused for a moment before continuing. “But it’s not the time for that,” he shook his head sorrowfully. “We’ll continue this investigation when reinforcements arrive. But for that, we need to contact them first,” he added. “How much time do you think you’ll need for your mission, General?” There was something flattering in the way he called her by her rank, even though he wasn’t obliged to do so. She figured it has something to do with his military attitude.

“Do you actually plan on taking her to ArcJet, sir?” they heard Rhys’ open-mouthed question.

“Affirmative, Knight,” he stated sternly.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea, sir,” he protested but Danse looked like he was used to his attitude. “We know nothing about her.”

“I can assure you that I wouldn't undertake this mission unless I had confidence in her abilities,” he furrowed his brows before looking back to Winter. “The way you charged in and engaged those ferals leaves no doubt in my mind that you've got what it takes.”

Preston grinned like a toothpaste advertisement, because that was the same thing he always said to her. It felt good to hear from Preston, but seemed like a bigger compliment coming from a high-ranking soldier.

Winter turned on the map on her Pip-Boy and contemplated on which route they should take. She ran her finger along the desired path to show it to Preston. “If we turn east after we pass by Diamond City, we should be there quickly by tomorrow morning.”

“Sounds good, I led the group of survivors on the same route when we left Quincy,” he recalled his memories and saddened at the thought. The memory was so daunting that every time it popped up he visibly lost control over his emotions.

“Will two days be enough?” She asked him and patted his shoulder to assure him of her support.

“I guess so. Maybe three, if there will be much opposition in the Castle,” Preston supposed.

“Roger that,” the Paladin followed their discussion attentively.

“Do you think you could spare some fusion cells?” Winter asked for the ammo required by Preston’s laser musket. “I know your laser weapons use that too...” She wouldn’t have been surprised by a negative answer.

“If there’s one thing we are not short on, that’s ammo,” the Paladin stated and went to the depot, which was towards the back of the facility. Winter remembered where the room was, she saw the label ‘depot’ on it, and that the lock was too hard for her to pick last time. She learned a few tricks since then, but a few months ago she had to leave without the exact thing she came here for; ammo. He soon returned and put down an oblong dark green box to the table. Preston looked inside it and his eyes grew large. “This is more than enough,” he started to pack the cells into his bag, “thank you.”

Danse placed a smaller light blue box in front of Winter. “I’ve got you some 10mm rounds too, but we don’t have any .308 calibers.” He payed attention to the details. She had no chance to use her sniper rifle in the combat, it remained mounted on her back the whole time.

“I’ve got plenty of pistol rounds, thank you,” she refused his offer. “And… I modified my rifle to use .50 calibers instead,” she explained to him.

“Did you?” His eyes sparkled with such admiration she wasn’t expecting from him. He certainly loved guns, which was not a bad trait for a soldier, she figured.

“Well, yeah,” she blushed under his newcome attention, “I figured it would be more effective.”

“That is for sure,” he agreed. He returned the empty case and the pistol rounds to the depot and returned with two similar sized, but leafgreen boxes. “This is all we got, but we only use ballistic weapons as last resort, so you can take these. Luckily, these bullets weren’t too popular before the war either,” he remarked, seemingly still amazed.

“Phew, thanks,” Winter grinned like an idiot and peeked inside the boxes. One was full, the other one was short by two - that meant 18 new rounds for her rifle. She quickly made place in her bag for the cartridges.

“Consider it an investment,” the Paladin said suggestively. “Now, you talked about some kind of mission, right?” he started, but Winter misunderstood his intentions.

They already exceeded their hospitality and she didn’t plan to abuse it any further. “You are right,” she hastily jumped up, “let’s go Preston!”, she motioned to him to follow her.

“Sorry if you misinterpreted my words,” he explained almost apologetically, straightening in his sitting, ready to jump up too. “I didn’t mean to throw you out. I was just inquiring about the details of your mission, to see if I can help.” He gestured her to sit back and Winter accepted. Danse leaned back in his chair, while Winter leaned her elbow on the table. Preston rested his hands on his lap.

“Oh, sorry.” Winter felt like she was the dumbest person alive. “Er, Preston?”

Preston was a little annoyed that Winter allotted the explanation to him, but he explained anyway. “We are about to retake the Castle,” he started, “which used to be the Minuteman HQ before my time.” Winter recalled the longing she saw in his eyes when he first told her the same story. The least they should do is a try.

“Used to?” The Paladin folded his arms. “What happened?”

Preston’s eye flinched. “There was a story about some kind of a monster coming out of the sea and destroying the fort,” he answered staring into the bullet holes Winter made when she killed the radroach months ago. He was overwhelmed by his emotions over the event, but the other man was unaffected and thus could think tactically.

“It had to be something amphibious,” he noted, then after a moment of silence he guessed, “mirelurks?”

He certainly caught Preston off guard. “I can’t be sure, but I hope so.” Winter remembered that they killed mirelurks before, those were tough, but not invincible. Sure, their hard shell was almost bulletproof, but they didn’t seem to like flames or any shot under their shells. “This was long before I joined up,” he added wistfully.

“I can’t think of any other creature able to survive both in water and on land,” Danse concluded. “Why bother to retake the fort now?”

Preston furrowed his brows like it was obvious. “It’s well-fortified, centrally-located, and most importantly - it has a powerful radio transmitter we can use to broadcast to the whole Commonwealth.” He raised his eyebrows a little as the Brotherhood recon team faced the same problem; they needed a better radio station.

“I see,” the Paladin tilted his head, understanding his mimics. “If you are really about to face mirelurks, my advice is to use landmines. Their undersides are vulnerable and they have more than enough legs to step on them.”

“I thought the same,” Preston agreed, tellingly.  _What are you up to, Preston?_ After all, mirelurks weren’t complicated creatures. Basically car sized crabs, which buried themselves into the mud to attack anyone who ventured close enough, but once they burst out the ground and started to chase their prey, they exposed their weak spots.

“One more thing,” Danse suddenly remembered something. “I heard that they can’t stand white noise.”

“White noise? What’s that?” Preston was the children of the wasteland, he wasn’t familiar with pre-war technical terms.

“Have you ever seen a television,  _Secondman_?” they heard the voice of Rhys from across the room.

“It’s Minuteman,” he corrected him needlessly, “and yes, I had.” Winter knew that Preston was irritated by him under his calm mask.

“Me too,” Winter added. It was like he asked that if she ever saw the colour green. She was sure that she saw more green on the last morning she spent before the war than during the whole time since.

“I mean a working one. Was it turned on?” he asked about.

“Once,” Preston nodded. “It only sizzle-fizzled. Didn’t seem much amusing to me.”

“Well, that fizz was the white noise,” he remarked like it was elementary for everyone to know that. Winter remembered that her parents called the phenomenon ‘ants’, and it sure looked like an angry ant hill when there was no broadcast.

“Do you think,” Winter speculated, “that if we could induce white noise then broadcast it through the radio transmitter, it would drive away the mirelurks?”

“Uh, yeah, possibly,” he answered with a fallen chin, but got himself together quickly, “a radio station should be able to produce it, if it still works.” He certainly underestimated her technical affinity. She was sure he won’t make the same mistake again.

“I had a television once,” she added enigmatically. “I loved watching the detective stories every thursday.” She wanted to see him squirm.

“Sure,” he huffed. “Don’t tell me you had a car too...” Of course she had, it was a four-door black sedan with a beautiful glass dome. Unsurprisingly it didn’t endure the last two hundred years well, so it ended up in the scrap heap. Neither did the roads, by the way so it was not a great loss.

“Thank you for your explanation, Rhys,” Danse silenced him with a commander’s routine. Rhys grimaced but had the decency to shut up. Winter just grinned at him, because she didn’t plan to convince him about her past now. It was her new hobby, to see how people react when she says things like this. So far, she found it entertaining but her smile faded from her face when she saw the stern expression of the Paladin.

“You seem to know a lot about mirelurks, Paladin,” Winter remarked civilly, then pried further, “Are mirelurks a problem where you came from, too?” She would really love to hear where these soldiers came from. From what they said, she deduced that they were a long way from home.

“Where radiated bodies of water are, mirelurks tend to show up too,” he answered. “I had my fair share of fighting them near the Citadel.” Winter loved how the names of places evolved since the Great War. Addresses had little use anymore as there was no governing force to supervise the system. The distances one needed or could travel during a lifetime drastically shrunk without proper means of transportation.

“The Citadel?” Preston asked curiously.

“It’s our headquarters back in the Capital Wasteland,” Danse explained. “The place I want to reach with the radio.”

“You mean Washington D.C.?” The former capital was only a frog jump away before the war, with airplane one could be back and forth in one day easily. She knew, because Nate had to report back to the Pentagon once. “That’s more than 400 miles away. Quite a trip without flying.” Winter noticed that the mention of flying inflicted a change in his expression.

“Yes, it was,” he narrowed his eyes. “You know a lot about pre-war life.” She realized that she wasn’t the only one who’s curious in the room. “Is it because you came from a Vault?”

“Yes and no,” she smiled mysteriously. She definitely attracted his attention to her origin. Most people just dabbed and said she was out of her mind, but she believed he will be able to accept it. She was ready to discuss it with him sometimes later, so she added, “but that’s a long story.”

“Affirmative,” Danse agreed and dropped the topic but his face remained puzzled. Winter would love to stay and fill him in with details about everything he would ask, but now wasn’t the time to discuss a long forgotten era. She had to look forward, to the future. The minutemen needed the Castle and its radio back.

“All right Preston, we should go,” Winter stood up relying on Preston’s shoulder. “Thank you for your advice and the clips, Paladin Danse,” she tapped at her bag before swinging it to her back and pulling the strap shorter.

“I’ll let you out,” he offered to show them out. “Good luck, General!”

“Thank you! I’ll be back in a few days,” she promised and offered her hand for a handshake. He acknowledged her answer with a nod and after an awkward moment she retracted her hand. It looks like this formality died out.

“I count on you, General,” Danse added confidentially.

She nodded back then turned around and left the building, with Preston at her side. They heard the big blue doors close and the lock engaging. What she wouldn’t give to hear their conversation right now.

“This way,” she recommended a way and Preston agreed. “Do you think we should hop into Diamond City for some mines?”

“That’s not necessary. We have a crate full of them, waiting for us at the Castle,” he smiled proudly.

“How long you’ve been planning it already?” she asked agaze. Though Preston was not the nominal leader of the Minutemen, his contributions to the cause showed otherwise. Sometimes Winter wondered if anyone would notice if she were gone for good.

“Long enough,” he teased her. “Let’s hurry.”

As they took their journey in the direction of the Great Green Jewel, she wondered why she wasn’t really surprised by that at all.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **This is an old, unedited chapter. I'll gradually update and split the chapters as I get thought them.**
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> Winter and Preston kicks some shells, then they have to settle an unfinished matter

Theresa and Nate were enjoying their lunch in the large inner courtyard of the Pentagon when a soldier stepped to their table with a tray in his hands.

“Hey, Irwin! Heard you were here, mind if I join you?”

Nate had to hand in a paper about his pension, and he brought her along for a little capitol sightseeing. She already had an hour long tour of the Pentagon while Nate was busy with bureaucracy.

“Platner!” he smiled at him radiantly, “What’s up,  _Corporal?_ ”

“I am Sergeant now,” he beckoned at his insignia, “so I finally outrank you,  _Officer_.” Theresa wondered what that supposed to mean.

“Someone clearly lost their mind promoting you, Greg,” Nate remarked with the unmistakable tone of bantering. “But where are my manners?” Nate became aware of his impropriety, “my darling wife Theresa,” he presented her and pressed a kiss on her hand.

“Congratulations on your wedding,” Platner nodded and smiled at her, “Nate’s a good lad,” he added what she already knew.

“Thank you,” she said politely.

“So, you are that attorney with the dazzling blue eyes Roger told about,” he noted casually, which caught her unprepared.  _What else did he say to his comrades?_ “He also said the ceremony was neat.”

“You know him?” she was only able to put together this simple question.

“He’s my superior,” he explained, “we are in the same unit and this good-for-nothing was too, before he ran...”

“Hey, it was my decision,” Nate huffed at him, but softened quickly when he realized that Platner was teasing him.

“I’m sure the petty criminals in Cambridge fear your name already,” he teased his friend.

“Hardly, I mostly got paperwork,” he laughed at his joke, but his face turned bitter swiftly. “I had had enough of what the military wanted me to do. I can fight for Uncle Sam in other ways,” he remarked with concern.

“True that, but I would love to have you with us at Mariposa Base,” Platner nodded and looked to his left, observing the many windows of the building. “I heard we are to be reassigned there.”

“Never heard of Mariposa,” Nate raised his eyebrows.

“They haven’t finished constructing it yet,” he revealed the mystery.

“Is it a cooperation with West-Tek too?” Nate pried further suspiciously.

“Look, I can’t say more,” Platner realized that he probably already told too much. “Shouldn’t have mentioned it at all,” he evaded to answer.

“So it is,” Nate concluded and Platner almost inconceivably nodded. “This is the exact reason I left, Gregory,” he told him with utmost confidence. “I didn’t sign up to rot in a research bunker,” he added with disgust.

 

It was breaking dawn by the time they reached the building where the Minutemen forces gathered in. Their journey took longer than she expected. One and a half days went by since they departed from Cambridge. Raiders decided to collect toll on a bridge they weren’t before and it took some time to  _convince_  them to let them go. Then they ran into a pack of mongrels and one of those bit Preston’s leg pretty bad. She administered a stimpak to him, but he still slowed them down slightly. He’ll need a doctor, but he said he only needed his hands to shoot with and those were all right.

Regarding the mission, it was mirelurks as both Preston and Paladin Danse predicted. The minutemen brought a large yellow crate, filled with fragmentation mines. Around fifteen minutemen were there, most of them in their trademark hats, while some of them were simple wastelanders who joined up mere weeks ago. Most of them were wielding the traditional minuteman weapon, the laser musket, and there weren’t two identical.

They held a battle meeting in a slightly ruined house, nearby. Winter and Preston debriefed the troops and decided what approach they should use. Someone suggested they should storm in, while others voted for a pincer attack, to get the enemy in crossfire. A third option was to draw them out, and Winter voted for that one, which ultimately settled it. They weren’t a real military group and she wasn’t an experienced tactician, but these people seemed to value her opinion. She hoped for a moment that Preston will talk her out of it, saying that they should go together, but he agreed with the plan.

She sneaked in to explore the ground features. Part of the wall was destroyed to ground level, so it didn’t require much agility to climb in. She saw a softshell mirelurk on the other side of the courtyard munching on something, and believed to see two or three other ones buried in the ground here and there. More of them could be in the rooms themselves. There were at least a dozen egg clutches scattered around the courtyard. She planted a row of mines in the line of the now collapsed wall, then retreated for more mines. She did it for four times before the crate halfway empty, as she didn’t want to use all up.

After three more Minuteman arrived, Preston sneaked next to her. “Everyone's here, General.” So, this was it, they were really doing it.

“Ready?” she turned back and Preston nodded. Winter swallowed a giant lump in her throat. She threw a grenade next to the softshell mirelurk then ran back to cover. She planned to snipe the mirelurks which manage to get past the minefield from a high vantage point.After the explosion of the grenade they heard the noises of mirelurks bursting out of the ground and the clicking noise of their chelicerae. One of them stepped on a mine and it tear its shell down. It spotted a minuteman and dashed at her, but was quickly disposed off by several musker shots. Winter knew that the mirelurks were aware of their presence by now.

Around half of the mirelurks managed to step on the mines, and some of them didn’t move after it. The rest were shot down by the firing line they set up. Winter shot down a few as well, she had a great view of the area from an old guard tower. When there were no more mirelurks storming out, she left her position and approached the wall stealthily. She climbed the wall and checked for mirelurks or undetonated mines, but there were neither.

“It’s clear,” she stated and the minuteman forces slowly started to penetrate the courtyard.

Preston caught up with her. “Damn, looks like they've been nesting. We're gonna have to take out these eggs or they'll be back before we know it.”

“‘Lurks like to hole up inside old buildings, so the walls are probably full of 'em,” a blonde man said, and Winter remembered him. He was one of those who were eager to storm in. He was probably right, because the Castle was an old motte, it’s walls were topped by dirt and grass. Perfect for repelling cannonade, but also for the mirelurks to hide in. Times changed, but the old fort still served well its inhabitants.

“Sure looks that way…” Preston agreed. “Here's how we're going to play this. You hold here in the courtyard and take care of any eggs you find. The General and I will clear the walls.”

“I have another idea Preston. The courtyard is clear for now. We stay here and get the radio running first. Which one of you is the radio expert?” She looked around.

“It’s me ma’am,” the blonde man stepped forward. “But we should clear them out first,” he shook his head.

“What’s your name?” she asked him, because it was easier to give order by naming the recipient.

“Dallas. Colbert Dallas,” the man straightened himself. He had a strong southern accent, and his name accompanied it well.

“Okay, listen here, Dallas,” she started to explain the plan. “We power up the radio to produce white noise, because the ‘lurks hate that.” She didn’t miss to spot that Preston rolled his eyes. “Do you know how to do that?”

“Aye, ma’am,” he nodded and Winter was glad to hear it.

“Good. Let’s go see if there's anything left of the old transmitter. If we manage to pull it off, they’ll run back to the sea.”

Dallas went to see the machinery. “I’ll cover your back, Colb,” Winter assured him. It took a several minutes for him to check the setup, while they got rid of the egg clusters in the courtyard. One of them found a flamer inside the fort and used that with deadly efficiency. Some eggs managed to hatch though, but the hatchlings were easily disposed by a kick of the boot.

“All lights green, all it need is some juice, General,” Dallas reported.

“I saw a generator inside,” the flamer-wielding woman remarked. “That way.”

Winter went to check it. It was very similar to her own generators, so she tried to start it, but it didn’t want to tick. She kicked it in her anger and that did it. Dense black smoke burst forth from it, and it eventually started humming. “Let’s wire them together,” she yelled out. Unfortunately, by doing so, she alerted two mirelurks inside the building to her presence. “Two more over here,” she called for help and she got the support from Preston.

“I still think we should clear the walls first,” he insisted. “The radio can wait.”

“No, we have to give it a try.” Winter was actually curious about the result by now. She heard in a documentary, before the war, that crabs were sensitive to high pitched sounds. She was sure that mirelurks were too.

“All right, I saw wires all along the walls, we can strip those,” he said, pointing to the conduits lined by the wall. Winter checked it, and it looked good. She estimated the wirelength needed and stripped more than enough. She turned off the generator and attached the end of the cable to it. Preston went with the other end to the radio. Once both ends were fixed, she turned the generator back on. It started smoothly this time. It didn’t like the cold start, but looked like it would work for now.

“General! Preston! You're gonna want to see this!” That didn’t sound good. Winter rushed out the fort to see an enormous mirelurk marching into the courtyard through the wall. She was sure that  _this_  was the sea monster Preston told her about. Or its ancestor was, she didn’t know how long mirelurks live, but if they were anything similar to ghouls, this could have been the same one. It was the size of a bus, so she figured it was their queen, similar to hornets or ants.

“Oh, hell! General, are you seeing this thing?” Preston asked, because he didn’t dare to get his eyes off of the giant beast to check her position.

“Hey,” Winter approached the radio guy, “give it all you’ve got!” She snapped him out of his amazement. “You know, white noise!”

She took cover and aimed the head of the beast. It wasn’t hard, as it was big enough. She tried to shoot its eye, but she missed it. The only thing she managed to achieve was to draw its attention to herself. The queen emitted some acidic spit and she wasn’t quick enough to retreat, so some of it burned her legs. “Aaargh,” she shrilled and tears shred from her eyes. She wiped them, because she needed to continue firing. She reloaded and tried another shot. This time she managed to hit one of its eyes. Too bad it had at least five more.

“Colb,” she urged Dallas to do something already, “All lights green?”

“Super green!”, she heard Dallas’ voice through the radio, “here we come!”, following by the loudest sounds she heard in awhile. Everyone covered their ears and Winter peeked up to see the queen’s reaction. It was visibly in pain, it writhed and roared left and right while producing an insane clicking noise.

“Everybody, concentrate your fire on the queen!” she heard Preston’s order and soon all the minutemen were firing the agonizing giant mirelurk. Winter switched to her pistol and she shot and entire magazine into her. While she reloaded, she looked around and saw that all the other mirelurks rapidly tried to get as far from the transmitter as it was possible. They didn’t bother to attack them anymore.

The queen was a formidable enemy as she didn’t retreat but tried to fight. She was alone, against around twenty men with laser weapons. In her view, the Minutemen were invading her home, where she dwelled for decades. They were attacking her children. Damn right she was upset. She understood that she won’t retreat like her kin did.

The queen burst another wave of acid spittle, but she couldn’t project it far enough now because the pain crippled her. Someone managed to shoot her supporting leg and it fall over. The queen crawled up once again, and snapped at the closest Minuteman with its pincers, but he easily evaded the strike. Its agony reminded to the fate of the unsuspecting flies she bug sprayed in her kitchen before the war. The queen was weakening every second and it wasn’t too long until the concentrated fire killed it. The queen collapsed with a terrifying scream and after a few ticks it didn’t move anymore.

There was no other sound in the courtyard, just the constant white noise. They got used to it, like airport workers got used to the noise. Preston was the first to say anything. “All right. Good work people, but we aren't done yet. General, let’s go check the walls. The rest of you... clear out any remaining Mirelurks or eggs you find.”

The man scattered but she didn’t hear anymore musket shots. The mirelurks left the Castle for good. She hoped they wouldn’t return later, when they eventually turn the noise off.

“Wow! We really did it!” Preston rejoiced like a child on Christmas day. “I've been watching the Minutemen fall to pieces for so long, I just... this is really something.” They were pacing atop the wall, seeing numerous holes from which mirelurks fled back to the sea. “Now we've got to pay off on what we've started. Bring the whole Commonwealth together, and make it last this time,” he was really in awe of their deed.

“I’m glad that I could help,” Winter smiled and looked around. The Castle really did worth the trouble. It was a worthy building for an HQ. Plenty of room for minuteman to sleep, easily defensible shoreline with a water purifier already in place. They could farm some mutfruits in the courtyard, and maybe some shops would be good as well.

“We could have taken it back with brute force, but this way we didn’t lose a single man,” he evaluated the situation. “Tell that soldier that I am grateful for his idea,” he added unwillingly. He seemed to have a hard time accepting that his plan wasn’t the one they followed.

“You’re not coming?” She asked, though she already knew the answer.

“No, I’m needed here,” he shook his head and nodded towards the courtyard. “Now that we are inside, we can repel them if they try to come back.”

“Just don’t turn off the white noise for a while,” Winter warned him. She wasn’t sure the mirelurks fled far enough already, but she believed that after a few days of it, they’ll learn that it doesn’t worth coming back anymore.

“I didn’t plan to, don’t worry!” he assured her with a grin. “But we’ll need to restore the broadcast sooner or later,” he added with a concerned voice.

“I know,” she beckoned and sat down to a little bump over an archway which was heading down the fort. “Do you think you can handle the situation?” She didn’t intend to leave him behind when he needed help.

“Yeah,” he nodded. “So, you know... back to business. But with Radio Freedom up and running, we’ll be able to broadcast alerts to you anywhere, anytime.”

“That’s great,” Winter noted, then sighed as she took a look of her legs and remember that his was injured as well.

“How’s your leg?” she asked him first.

“It’s getting better, almost healed,” he said. “No need for that doctor,” he shook his head with a relieved smile.

“You know that it wouldn’t hurt,” she admonished him. Like a man, he was inclined to put everything in front of his health.

“Yours?” he asked her instead, to avoid answering.

“Fine, at least nothing a stimpak and a few days of poultice wouldn’t heal.” She pinched the remains of her trousers, “but this was my favourite jeans,” she grimaced.

Preston looked at her for a moment before he cracked up, which caused her to laugh too. For long minutes they just laughed, so much that the back of her head started to ache were her masticatory muscles inserted. It was a good feeling that the greatest loss today was a pair of jeans.

Winter scanned the horizon, where the sea met the sky in the distance. It looked so peaceful from up here.

“Things slowly start to look nice again,” Preston broke the silence. “All thanks to you,” he added, looking at her with wistful eyes.

Winter knew that it was only a matter of time before he comes up with the topic. They had a similar conversation weeks ago. Maybe she was too polite back then?

“Don’t, Preston,” she shuffled away a little as she suddenly started to feel uncomfortable sitting right next to him. “I understood you last time crystal clearly.”

“Oh, good. I guess I was more coherent than I thought.” Winter had no heart to tell him that she was suspecting his feelings for quite some time. He didn’t let her know by words, because he never said it exactly, but by always returning to the topic Winter deduced it. She confronted him once to see if he was thinking about her romantically and he admitted. He must have misinterpret her question, because he changed since then. He pushed the topic from time to time and Winter started to get annoyed by it.

She valued Preston as a friend, but couldn’t imagine more. She really couldn’t tell what she didn’t like in him, but she didn’t feel the same way. Since he didn’t want to accept her rejection, she told him that she still loved Nate and she’s not ready to move on. She didn’t want their friendship to end, so she figured a little lie wouldn’t hurt. She moved on, but she wasn’t waiting for him.

“The thing is…” he hesitated to continue, but managed to gather himself, “when you asked me if I'd ever thought about becoming more than friends… My feelings for you. They haven't changed.” How many times Winter damned her question, because it planted false hope in him and then her lie just provided a breeding ground for his thought that there was a chance for anything between them, if he waited long enough. “I know you said that you weren't ready to move on. I thought maybe, now that some more time has passed... well, that maybe you were ready to give us a chance.”

Unlike last time, she was ready to pop that balloon now.

“No. Sorry, but I… I don’t feel the same way. Never did.” He furrowed his brows, and Winter decided to take one more blow in. “I don’t love you, Preston,” she added, just for the sake of saying it out loud.

It was his time to feel awkward in his sitting, and he elected to stand up and walked a few paces away. He looked down the courtyard and tried to pay attention to what’s going on down there. He didn’t move or gave any other sign of what was going on inside him, but he turned his face into the opposite direction the whole time. Once he turned back, his face was neutral. “Got it, General. I'm sorry for stepping over the line. It won't happen again, I promise.”

Winter felt really bad for him now, but she was sure he felt worse. But it was better for both of them. She wasn’t sure if she should add anything, and the moment passed.

“I guess we should get back to it, huh?” he asked rhetorically, then went down the staircase she was sitting above. She didn’t follow him, just watched as he took charge of the situation around the Castle. She slowly stood up, and walked around the wall to have a last look at the Castle. They will definitely need to fix the walls, but most of the interior seemed intact. She descended down on the opening of the wall where they first entered. She knew that he needed time, and she was willing to give it to him.

She stepped up to a Minuteman in the courtyard, “take care out here.”

“You leave, General?” she asked agaze. She knew it wasn’t the best decision to leave them now, but she had to honor her promise, and she was sure that Preston will be able to coordinate the work here, even without her.

“There are people out there, waiting for me to help them, you know.”

If anyone, a minuteman should understand it. “Tell Garvey that I’ll be back in a week,” she told her and she nodded with a puzzled look. Winter turned around and left the Castle without looking back, and headed towards west. If she was lucky, she would be in Cambridge by the evening.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Winter returns to Cambridge Police Station for the umpteenth time, which brings up some memories.
> 
>  
> 
> **This is an old, unedited chapter. I'll gradually update and split the chapters as I get thought them.**

“What do you mean you can’t let me in?” Winter asked incredulously. It was late night by the time she reached Cambridge and she wasn’t happy to be held up a few steps before reaching safety.

“I have my orders,” she heard Rhys’ growling behind the blue door.

“You have orders not to let me in?” she pried further with a doubting voice. She didn’t like it and wanted to understand the situation.

“I have orders to protect the Brotherhood from anything and anyone would threaten us,” he grumbled.

“I’m not a threat, Rhys,” she tried to convince him, “I promised to help you.”

“I don’t care,” he stated categorically. “You won’t come in.”

“It’s late night,” she tried again.

“Then I suggest to seek shelter somewhere,” he responded with a gruff voice.

“You stubborn bastard,” Winter cursed under her breath.

“I heard that,” Rhys gnarled viciously through the safety of the doors.

“What’s going on Rhys?” Haylen’s voice filtered out to her solitude.

“Nothing,” Rhys had the nerve to lie about the situation.

“Were you sleepwalking then?” Haylen mocked him, but she knew that she didn’t give much chance for that. Though Winter was compelled to hear his answer to this, she has had enough already and she banged the door with her fist three times, “Haylen!”

“Wait, is that…?” Haylen asked from her comrade, “Rhys, let her in already!”

“Why?” he nagged. If Winter thought earlier that Danse was stubborn, well Rhys was worse than that. Must be part of their job description.

“She helped us,” Haylen snapped at him, “and promised to help us getting the transmitter.” Winter started to like Haylen.

“I don’t care,” Rhys resisted, “I don’t want her to cut my throat while I sleep.” So, this all was about his personal mistrust, not an order, Winter deducted.

“If that’s all you worry about, I won’t,” she promised. “I don’t even have a knife,” she added to ease his mind. “You can search me, if you want,” she added reluctantly, but would have been happy to avoid being touched by his hands.

“Step aside,” she heard the voice of the scribe so close that she knew she came down to their level.

“I don’t take orders from you,” Rhys rebuked her and Haylen didn’t reply, just marched up the stairs. Winter changed tactics.

“Okay, I get it, you don’t need my help then?” She was sure that he wasn’t at a liberty to say no after his commanding officer trusted her but she was unpleasantly surprised by his answer.

“Exactly,” he persevered.

Winter looked at her shadow casted by the moonlight. She simply didn’t want to believe that Paladin Danse made up his mind. He seemed sincere last time. “That’s your opinion or--” she tried to get answers from Rhys but a certain somnolent voice caught her attention, so she started to listen to what was happening further inside.

“...I take there’s a good reason for waking me up, Scribe Haylen?”

“Shit,” she heard Rhys murmuring under his nose. He wasn’t pleased by the turn of things.

“The Minuteman General returned, sir,” Haylen reported the situation. Apparently she went and woke up the authority to settle the debate.

“Good. Where is,” Danse started a question and Winter believed that he looked around looking for her, so she knocked on the door again to signal her position.

“What the hell is wrong with you, soldier?” she heard an angry growl from the Paladin. “Let her in, Knight,” he commanded.

“Yes, sir,” Rhys replied dutifully, but with a hint of disapproval in his voice. His face wasn’t any better either as he opened the door and ushered her in. Winter scowled at him as she passed him.

“I’m here as I promised, Paladin,” she spoke to Danse first. Nate told her once that most officers like to be addressed before their subordinates.

“Of course you are,” he nodded confidently, “I had no doubt about your eventual return.”

“I kept my word,” Winter assured him. “I wouldn’t have give it otherwise.”

“Excellent. I suggest to discuss the mission details tomorrow morning,” Danse called quit.

“Okay,” she agreed as she wasn’t in the mood to discuss tactics.

“I’m sorry for waking you up, sir,” Haylen apologized as Rhys locked the doors, “but Rhys didn’t want to open the door.”

“Not a problem, Haylen,” he reassured his scribe warmly before turning to Rhys and switching to a stern expression. “Rhys, we’ll talk about this incident tomorrow.”

“Understood,” he acknowledged curtly as he passed Winter and headed to the room on the left. Once he was out of sight, Haylen smiled at her amiably and squeezed her shoulder, before returning to her terminal. Winter rubbed her temples and exhaled all the air from her lungs.

“Everything all right?” Danse observed her with his arms folded.

“Yes, it’s just I’m exhausted,” she shrugged. “I could use some sleep,” she added because haven’t slept in two days.

“Same here,” he admitted wearily and rubbed his eyes. “There’s a bedroll in that room you can use,” Danse pointed to a man sized hole in the wall at the corner.

“Thank you,” Winter replied gratefully. “I think I’ll wrap myself up right away.”

“Where’s your partner?” he inquired and she had to suppress a scowl.

“Preston remained at the Castle with the Minuteman forces to restore the radio,” she explained.

“Glad to hear you accomplished your mission,” he remarked and suppressed a yawn. He looked really tired, like he haven’t slept for days, as he probably didn’t. “Though I’d like to hear more, I suggest we get some sleep right away,” he remarked, looking at the ruins of her trousers for a brief moment.

“Good idea,” she agreed and headed to the room where she was supposed to find her bedroll and to her surprise, the paladin followed her. Looking around the room she realized that she didn’t see the other Knight anywhere, “How’s Keane?”

“He died not much after you left,” he said bitterly. “We disposed his body for sanitary reasons.”

“I’m sorry,” Winter expressed her condolences to which he closed his eyes for a moment.

“Do you need help with the bag?” he offered but he quickly got his answer when Winter rolled the thing next to the wall and opened the zip on it without any hesitation.

“I’ve been camping before,” she replied, didn’t realizing that she used a pre-war phrase again until she saw his broody expression.

“We’ll have a lot to discuss tomorrow,” he noted contemplatively as he climbed into his sleeping bag. “Good night, General,” he said before turning to face the wall.

“Good night, Paladin,” she replied as she slipped into her bag and pulled the zip up to keep herself warm.

 

Opening her eyes she realized that she was still at his place. She yawned and stretched herself before releasing a content hum as she recalled the last night.

She felt him turning around and his arm entangled her as he whispered to her ear, “good morning, beautiful.”

She smiled at him and run her fingers into his long black hair, stroking his nape.

“Officer,” she teased him and bit her lips.

“I’m glad you decided to stay,” he pulled her closer and kissed her shoulder.

“I have a thing for men in uniforms,” she said as she drew circles on his shoulder and watched his skin developing a trail of goosebumps wherever her finger lingered.

“And I thought it might has something to do with me,” he said playfully, but looking at his dark eyes she saw that he was worried that she might not come back again.

“It  _has_ ,” she cupped the left side of his face and grazed his cheek before pulling him closer for a kiss. It was short and sweet, and she couldn’t have been happier. Ever since she moved to Cambridge, she couldn’t find a good date, but now it seemed she was in a luck.

But the stubbles, oh dear, she couldn’t stand those. “Agh, you’re stinging. Go shave yourself, Nate. Or grow a beard.”

“I’m a mustache man, Theresa,” he bantered before he went in a full attack of tickling her with his rough chin.

 

By the time Winter woke up she was the only person in the sleeping area, the other sleeping bags were abandoned. She got up slowly because she was cramping all over. She never liked to camp, especially not inside a building. Bedrolls were more suited for using over natural terrain.

She quickly checked if her look was acceptable before stepping out to the lobby. Her trousers were almost completely ruined, but she didn’t have a replacement and they hid just enough.

“Good morning,” she greeted the only person she saw around; Scribe Haylen.

“Good morning,” Haylen smiled back. “I was hoping I don’t have to wake you up too,” she frowned theatrically. She exited her files on the terminal and locked it as she stood up.

Winter checked the time on her Pip-Boy. “Whew, I slept well.”

“Yeah, I saw that,” she narrowed her eyes. “Are you okay? What happened to your legs?” she hammered her about her medical condition.

“The mirelurk queen hit me with some kind of acid, but it’s not serious. I used a stimpak and it’s already healing nicely,” she summarized it to her.

“I’d like to take a look,” she insisted with the undying tenacity of a doctor.

“Uh, okay,” she gave her consent but bashfulness quickly overwhelmed her. “Where’s Danse and Rhys?”

“Don’t worry, they won’t walk in,” she understood the reason behind her hesitation, so Winter got off of her ruined trousers and sat down to a crate. Haylen produced a tiny flashlight from one of her many pockets and started to examine her legs.

“Rhys locked himself into a cell to make sure you can’t reach him,” she started with the man who she cared less about and proceeded to apply pressure to various areas on her thighs. Haylen chuckled and added, “Danse sneaked up on him this morning and took the keys from him while Rhys was fast asleep. Now he has his time to calm down,” she smirked.

Winter suppressed a laughter, “and Paladin Danse?”

“He’s tinkering his power armor in the garage,” Haylen replied, pointing with her thumb behind her back. “You didn’t lose muscle mass, but your skin will be sensitive for a while. You got off cheaply,” she sentenced her diagnose.

“I know,” she sighed and pulled her torn trousers up again.

“You made it sound like it was nothing to deal with a…,” she shook her head unbelievingly, “how did you say, a ‘queen’?”

“Because it  _was_  nothing,” Winter stated like she was saying that the sky is blue. When she saw the gigantic mirelurk emerging from the sea, she didn’t think it’ll be that simple to destroy it. “The white noise trick worked.” Haylen nodded like she already knew that.

“Actually,” she decided to initiate her, “I was checking for new broadcasts and I managed to tune to a weak static signal on medium wavelengths. I told the guys you did it, but Rhys didn’t believe me.”

“Do you have the frequency?” Winter caught on the opportunity.

“The Minutemen didn’t tell you?” she wondered. “Aren’t you the highest ranking amongst them?”

“I am,” Winter grinned, “but I departed abruptly.” She frowned as she recalled the reason of her quick escape. She wanted to get far from Preston as soon as it was possible so much that she forgot everything else.

“May I?” she reached for her hand mounted device and Winter let her to add the frequency to her Pip-Boy’s quick access list. Winter was amazed how familiar Haylen was with the personal computing device of the RobCo industries. She had a hard time to handle it sometimes. It mustn’t have been the first time she saw a Pip-Boy. She also added an entry called ‘AF95’. “Just in case,” she winked and Winter believed she caught her intention.

“Thanks, for both,” she nodded gratefully and let her hand fall to her side. “Do you think I'd have a place in the Brotherhood?”

“Absolutely,” she said without hesitation, “and if what you already told us about your past is true, I would be more than happy to have you around.” It seemed Haylen paid attention to her life story when she briefed it two days ago.

“Would you?” she asked amazed and wanted to hear more about it, “why?”

“I know it sounds crazy,” she started and occasionally stopped a few times, “and contradicts everything I learned…” she tried to formulate her next sentence, “but I  _believe_  that you were alive before the Great War,” she deduced and Winter knew that she already believed her. “If you just made it up, you wouldn't be this consistent about the details.”

“Yeah,  _crazy_ ,” she noted as she looked around for any newspaper which seemed intact enough for her purpose. She saw one on the reception table and quickly glanced at her before she went to retrieve it. Haylen watched her curiously. Winter picked up the Boston Bugle and opened it up to see if her advertisement was visible. “Eighth page, bottom-left corner,” she handed her the bugle and her eyes scanned the lines.

“ _Irwin and Co. Law Firm_ ,” Haylen read it out loud, “ _undertakes your legal cases, contact us with confidence. Advice, counsel, solution - we have it. Boston, Commonwealth Avenue 205_ ”

Nate said that including a photograph of herself and her partner was an overkill but she insisted on it, because she believed that trust emerges from good first impression and a studio made portrait usually did it better than her coffee-thirsty morning visage. She only started her ad campaign in October, so it wasn’t even a month before the bombs fell, but it attracted some decent clients to her office. And now it proved useful once more.

“Theresa Irwin, law attorney, at your service,” she produced the most pre-war smile she was able to and offered her her hand, but like Danse, she didn’t understand the gesture either. “You should hold and shake my hand,” she explained and moved her hand to position, “like this. My name is Scribe Haylen, nice to meet you,” she said in her stead before releasing the puzzled woman’s hand.

“So I  _was_  right,” she stated agaze, not really caring about the etiquette lesson she received, only switching her eyes between her picture and her face.

“You are,” she verified her guess, “most people don’t believe me though,” she remarked with played resentment. “Nice to see someone who does, for a change,” she remarked friendly.

Haylen just nodded almost inconceivably and she decided to change topic because if she started to tell her whole story now, they would never get to ArcJet this year.

“Anyway,” she remembered that Preston was curious about what a ‘scribe’ exactly was, “what else a scribe does beside healing and operating a radio?” she pried further.

“I think we’ll have more than enough time to talk about me after you returned from ArcJet Systems,” she avoided to answer her. “Don’t make Danse wait,” she warned her. “He made me sure to evaluate if you are clear for the mission.” Winter looked at her with her head tilted, to hear her verdict. “ _You_  are,” she twinkled then unrest settled on her face.

“What about him?” she asked about the Paladin. “How’s his headache?”

Haylen must have been fond of her commander, because she glanced at her gratefully for her question.

“I told him that it might be because he works too much,” she shook her head slowly, “but until he refuses to sleep enough, I can’t do much against his pain. I don’t have the necessary equipment to thoroughly examine his symptoms. I don’t want to put you under much pressure, but we really need that radio transmitter soon,” she added impatiently.

“Garage, got it,” Winter acknowledged her request and headed towards the staircase leading to the basement, much to Haylen’s amusement. “I know the way.”

As she lept through the door which connected the office and reception area once again, she allowed herself a quick look at  _his_ old desk. How many times she sat on that corner…

 

Theresa was equally upset and sad when she arrived at the Police Station in a hurry, only to see that Nate wasn’t waiting for her as he promised. She went inside and saw that he was buried under an avalanche of files behind the reception desk, so she queued up. At her turn, she elbowed on the counter and looked at Nate. He didn’t look up from his papers when he asked how can he help.

She didn’t want to believe that he forgot their date night.

“Officer,” she started, trying to hit a deeper tone to fool him, “I want to denounce negligent treatment.” She couldn’t believe it worked, because he just continued sorting the papers and eventually clipped them together.

“Um,” he tried to recollect where the blanks were stored, “third drawer, A729 form. Fill it and bring it back here.” She knew which cabinet he talked about and went to it, leaving him alone.

“Third one from the top or the bottom?” she asked the stupidest thing she could came up with, because the cabinet had exactly five drawers. He seemed to know it too, because he looked up to see a woman dumb enough to ask something like that.

When he saw that it was her, his cheeks reddened. “Oh, Theresa,” he smiled at her nervously and started to organize the papers more hastily. “I couldn’t get away yet, I’m sorry.”

“Hope you didn’t forget we have cinema tickets for tonight,” she smiled at him as she reminded him.

“Of course I don’t,” he smiled back with the most radiant smile he could produce at the moment and placed a folder into a document holder.

“What happened, Nate?” she asked him, as he went left the reception desk and opened the door next to the counter to let her inside the office area.

“Boss wanted to see me,” he started as he closed the door behind her and she gave her a fleeting kiss and stroked his face, before running her arms around his middle. “But he didn’t leave his office since that detective arrived,” he continued and unintentionally looked at the chief’s door.

“Oh, I see,” she said with flashing eyes and projected herself towards said door.

“No, wait!” Nate tried to stop her before she could knock but was too late to stop her. She knocked firmly and immediately heard a chair moving and in a couple of seconds, Chief O’Neill opened his door wide, looking at her with a puzzled glare.

“May I disturb you for a moment, Chief?” she gathered her courage but tried to hit a polite tone.

“A moment, if you may,” he beckoned sternly, but his attitude seemingly eased by her cautious approach.

“Yeah, I’m sorry,” she backed away a little, so he turned back to the man who meanwhile got up from his sitting.

“Do you need anything else?” he asked from the detective as he went to retrieve his hat from the rack.

“No, that’s all,” he smiled and put on his fedora. “Thanks for your help, Ralph.”

“Anytime, Nick. See you,” he said goodbye and turned back to her, “now, what can I do for you, miss?”

“Erm, Officer Irwin and I,” she started to explain her situation to him and looked at Nate, who was palming his face, “we have cinema tickets for tonight and we’ll miss the show if we don’t leave soon.”

“Irwin,” he looked at him, “did you finish those reports?”

“Yes,” he picked up a pile of papers from his nearby desk and handed it to his boss, “here they are.” It was already there when she entered the premise. He must have finished it long ago.

“Good,” he tucked the stack under his armpit, “I believe you have a motion picture to see…” he urged him to leave and added “and Nate... next time if you have a date, tell me, okay?” He sounded like a father talking to his son about the important things in life, but Nate’s military background kicked in, because he straightened himself like he just got an order.

“Yes, sir!”

“It’s not the army, Nate,” O’Neill looked at him slightly concerned.

“Old habits die hard,” he nodded and a grin occupied his face when he realized that it wasn’t anything like that.

“I hope we catch the airing,” Theresa worried as she tried to usher Nate to follow her.

“When does your show start?” they heard the detective’s voice behind their back.

“Um, at 1900,” Nate replied surprised.

“Where?” the detective continued prying.

“At Kendall,” Theresa helped out. The cinema was a good walk from the police station.

“You won’t get there by foot comfortably,” he remarked. “If you don’t mind, I’d like offer you a ride.”

“It’s not necessary,” Nate protested, “Mister…?”

“Valentine. Nick Valentine,” he offered his hand for a handshake, “and I insist. It’s the least after making your lady to wait,” he remarked and raised his hat.

“Well, thank you Mr. Valentine, we accept it,” Theresa took charge of the situation.

“This way, after you,” he showed them to the staircase leading to the garage.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Winter and Paladin Danse are off to a mission to get the DRT.
> 
> **This is an old, unedited chapter. I'll gradually update and split the chapters as I get thought them.**

The garage itself hasn't changed much, though the two hundred years had its toll on it. The most notable change was that someone set up a power armor station after the War but before the Brotherhood team arrived. When she several months ago looted the place, it was already there. She didn’t forget to pick up some tools from the garage, but their absence wasn’t a big deal, as the recon team brought its own tools.

Paladin Danse was kneeling behind his power armor, with a blowtorch in his hand, observing his work on the plating of the armor. When he decided it still needed some adjustment, he ignited the flame and pointed it to the problematic join with great care. The tools fit in his hands so naturally that Winter suppressed her breath as she watched him work. Apparently he didn’t notice her coming down and she didn’t want to disturb his concentration. After a minute or so, he stopped and put down the blowtorch, so she cleared her throat, “Paladin Danse?”

He looked up at her over his shoulder, “General,” he greeted her formally. “I trust you slept well?” he surprised her with his question, but he seemed to truly care, not just asking because decorum required.

“Quite well, yes,” she nodded in a friendly manner, not wanting to share that every inch of her body ached, but she was fresh intellectually and her eyes were well-rested too and she usually only used the latter two in charged situations.

“Good to hear. Wish I had the luxury as well,” he turned back to his suit, double-checking for any sign of repair needed, but he eventually nodded contently and stood up.

“You should listen to Scribe Haylen, you need to rest,” she told him as he put the tools back to their place.

“Until reinforcements arrive, I am not allowed to do that,” he raised his brows and slowly shook his head.

“Why not?” she asked agaze, not wanting to believe that anyone could be that dedicated.

“As a Paladin,” he started to lecture her, “I am responsible for tactical and security matters, and I need to lead by example,” and after a momentary pause he added, “I don’t intend to give up and head home… or end up missing.” Winter had to give him, he was determined.

“I wouldn’t consider working till you drop dead a good example,” she shook her head over his unshakable attitude. “I don’t think the Brotherhood would want to lose another recon team,” she reminded him of the fate or the previous team which came to the Commonwealth.

“What happened to Recon Squad Artemis is tragical,” he agreed, “but everyone who signs up for recon duty accepts the possible consequences. I will not let the Brotherhood down,” he remarked confidently, “especially when we are this close to discover something important.”

“I still don’t think that to over exhaust yourself solves anything,” she contradicted him.

“I appreciate your concern, but I am able to carry out my duties,” he raised his brows slightly and switched from self-defense to counter-attack, “What about you?” he inquired with a commander’s voice and she decided to drop the topic for now.

“Haylen said I’m cleared for duty,” she told him the medic’s prognosis.

“Excellent,” he beckoned like he was waiting for a similar answer. “Are you ready to get the transmitter?”

“Frankly, I don’t know,” she told him honestly. She had no idea what to prepare for, but she was used to it; she always managed to either fight her way through or was able to sneak away, back to safety if she faced too much opposition.

“I need you to do whatever it takes to be combat ready,” he remarked with a tone which made her feel like she was a low-ranking Brotherhood soldier but she didn’t really mind it. For this mission she was considered her subordinate, she perceived.

“Unless there will be dozens of suiciders, deathclaws or sentry bots, I think I can handle anything,” she tapped at her pistol holstered on her left side with one hand and got hold of the strap with which kept her rifle on her back with the other. “I’d eat something for breakfast and then we can go,” she propounded.

“Outstanding, General,” he acknowledged her response, but her rank just didn’t made sense in this context coming from the Paladin’s mouth. Hell, it didn’t made any sense,  _ever_.

“Okay, could you do something, Paladin?” she decided to do something against this nonsense. It reminded her too much about Preston and the situation she left him was among the last things she wanted to think about.

“What would it be?” he asked back with interest.

“Stop calling me General, please,” she pleaded him.

“How do you want me to call you?” he asked with a baffled expression.

“Winter would be fine,” her answer came fast.

“Is that a family name?” he asked back perplexed.

“Not mine,” she said remembering the pre-war mobster Eddie Winter, it was hard to forget him as his face was literally everywhere on the covers of the last issues of newspaper printed before the war, and she just saw his visage fifteen minutes ago on the Bugle she handed to Haylen. Looking back, she would have think twice before choosing the surname of a powerful mafia leader, but she didn’t notice her mistake until it was too late and more than a dozen people believed or assumed that she was related to him, if not in a biological, then in a professional way. She suddenly became aware that she’s in the middle of a conversation, “it’s a nickname, but the people around here mostly know me by it,” she replied.

“That would be inappropriate,” he furrowed his brows and hit the release of his power armor.

“Why?” she asked him and watched him stepping into the armor, “It’s a name I chose for myself.”

It wasn’t everyday she saw the opening mechanism of the power armor from the spectator's eye and she was still fascinated by the complexity of the frame. Even without armor pieces on, the frame was a technological marvel. He took his helmet off to be able to address her properly, “you’re the leader of a local militia, I shall give you the respect that is due,” he explained politely.

“You said it yourself that I don’t have an army,” she pointed out. “There are about…” she tried to count the forces at the Castle, plus minus the uncertainty constant, “two dozen Minutemen currently. It’s more of an honorary title anyway,” she added unnecessarily, because she saw in his eyes that his attitude was intractable.

“It’s not the army that matters, but the protocol. I lost four good men out of the six I started with, but I expect unwavering loyalty from the remaining two nevertheless. Decorum exists for a reason,” he tried to interpret his viewpoint.

“How about the lowest rank of the Brotherhood of Steel then?” she asked provocatively. It took a moment for him to understand the connotative meaning of her question.

“You want to join us?” His face didn’t express too much feelings, apart from caution.

“I might be interested in it, yes,” she answered in a positive, but not too explicit way.

“I’ll consider your request,” he answered politely, almost coldly, “we’ll talk about it after the mission’s done,” he stated without leaving room for contradiction.

“Thanks,” she was grateful that he was willing to think about it and not said ‘no’ categorically.

“Not a problem,” he nodded in an almost friendly manner and opened the door leading up to the station for her.

Winter was munching on some tasteless rations Danse gave her and watched as he issued orders for his subordinates. She already received a short debriefing on the mission, though it was rather generalized and mostly about the site itself. They were in the opposite end of the room, and she didn’t want to pry on their conversation, so she tried to distract herself with her Pip-Boy, without much success. The debriefing was longer than she expected, Danse was thoroughgoing, but his men didn’t seem to mind - or were used to him.

Rhys was sitting next to Haylen’s terminal, with his arms folded in front of his chest and a short-tempered glare over his face whenever he looked at her. His leg was getting better already, but he still had to rest according to Haylen, so he had to sit during the debriefing, much to his own dismay. Winter believed that he hated the fact that she saw him vulnerable. Haylen was standing straight in front of Danse, with one of her hands supporting the other, and fidgeting with a ballpoint pen in the air.

“Rhys, I decided to overlook your insubordination and the  _scene_  that followed it yesterday,” he stated to his Knight and Rhys seemed relieved about his generosity.

“Thank you, sir.” Even though he didn’t trust her, Winter wasn’t angry at the Knight. His mistrustful attitude was still better than if he had held her on gunpoint, “it won’t happen again,” he promised.

“Better not,” he seemed satisfied with his answer, “otherwise you’ll find yourself in that cell again.” She didn’t see Danse’s face, but she believed he made a fatherly glare, even though she perceived that Rhys was the older of the two men.

Danse turned around as he finished the debriefing and indicated to the scribe to follow him as he stepped up to Winter.

“Haylen,” he suppressed his voice, so only the two women could hear him, “do we have any application forms with us?” he asked and Haylen warmly smiled at him because she understood what was happening. It didn’t take him much time to make up his mind, it seemed, but Winter was well aware that he haven’t said ‘yes’ for her application yet, and just if he could read her mind, he added “nothing official yet,” confirming her last thought.

“Yes, sir,” Haylen winked at Winter, “I’ll have them ready by the time you'll get back.”

“Thank you, Haylen,” he nodded, trying to keep a straight face, but his laughing wrinkles showed that he liked the scribe and judging from Haylen’s earlier concern, it was mutual. Winter had herself entertained by the thought that there might more between the two, but she dismissed it; it wasn’t any of her business even if there was.

“All right...” his voice came to a halt for a moment, but then he decided not to use any titles and Winter was grateful for his effort, “it’s time to prove your worth,” he said and twirled his helmet before putting in on, “follow me and try not to lag behind.” He said it like this mission was a last test before he decides about her membership.

“I promise you’ll get your Paladin back in one piece,” she joked as she hied after him, putting her goggles in front of her eyes.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **This is an old, unedited chapter. I'll gradually update and split the chapters as I get thought them.**

ArcJet Systems was a pleasant, little more than an hour long trip to the west from the Police Station. Winter and Paladin Danse left Cambridge on the route she arrived several days earlier; but they soon took a left turn and remained along the river bank, fighting off any and all hostiles on the road. It wasn’t Winter’s preferred travel style, but she relied on her temporary companion for protection, especially that it was him who drew attraction towards themselves the first place. “Hostiles,” he announced and charged ahead, which let her stay back and aim from a distance, so it worked ultimately. She thought that she could get used to a traveling companion like Danse, one who attracts the attention of the enemies while she clears them - or at least some of them - from a distance.

A group of raiders thought it would be a smart idea to attack a power armored soldier with a sniper at his side after they mercilessly robbed a caravan dead. One of them decided to charge at the Paladin with a pool cue, so she crouched down for stability and shot the culprit before even getting close, while the Paladin was busy gunning down his low-life friends. She was glad that there was one less raiding company in the Commonwealth, especially that they were right under the foothills of Graygarden, one of the settlements the Minutemen were responsible for.

“What are you doing?” he asked wonderingly when she swung her rifle to her back and approached the corpses.

“I’m not going to leave all this stuff here,” she started to search the various luggages mounted on the dead brahmin for things that would fit in her haversack. She produced a chalk from her pack and started to draw different symbols at the wooden crate, which was around eye-level, “this will signal to my provisioner that she should transfer this stuff to one of our settlements.” She wrote the letters ‘GG’ on it and drew a stylized lightning in a square. The Paladin had no choice but to stand guard.

“Traveling this far from the police station is a risk,” he said during waiting, “but getting that transmitter up and running needs to be our top priority. If it was up to me, I'd relocate my team, but Scribe Haylen detected some disturbing energy readings in the area that need to be investigated.” She found a hot plate, some copper wires and some duct tape.

“What kind of energy readings?” she asked about, showing that she payed attention to his monologue.

“We don't know much about them, except that they're short-lived and broadcast on a frequency only obtainable with a high level of technology,” he answered in an official voice, “we're concerned that whoever or whatever is creating those energy readings might be a potential threat, so it's our job to investigate,” he said with a determined tone.

“Sounds like it’s the Institute,” she remarked dryly.

“Not a far fetched guess. You heard about them?” he pried further with an interrogators curiosity.

“Everyone in the Commonwealth heard about the Institute, they’re the boogeyman around here,” she raised her brows, “but it seems their reputation reached Washin-” she stopped herself and corrected the name, “the Capital Wasteland as well. What does the Brotherhood know about them?”

“Not much. They're a group of scientists who went underground when the Great War started. Spent the last few decades littering the Commonwealth with their technological nightmares,” he said passionately, clenching his fist.

“That part I noticed,” she noted gloomily, “they kidnap people or replace them with synths, for God knows what reason. I already saw it twice, neither ended nicely. If something inexplicable happens, people always assume it was the Institute,” she shared the popular belief with him, should he never heard it. All the other things however, would have been a long tale, so she cut it short and collected her bravery to ask for help, “may I ask you a favor?”

“What would it be?” he replied cautiously.

“If your team finds anything out about the Institute, I’d like to know,” she pleaded.

“Why?” He was understandably wary.

“They kidnapped my son,” she shared what most people only assumed, but she had seen with her own eyes.  _Twice._ “I want to find them.” The bald bastard’s words ringed in her ears. “ _You don't find the Institute. The Institute finds you.”_

“Are you sure it was them?” he shifted his weight and even obscured by his helmet, she knew his expression changed.

“Absolutely. I have evidence,” she added enigmatically, but it was enough for him.

“I see no harm in sharing some of our knowledge with you,” he nodded curtly then readied his rifle, “we’ll discuss it later. Let’s move out.”

After they crossed under the highway, a squad of bloodbugs decided to prey on them and their slim figures made it harder to hit them. Mosquitoes were irritating even before the War, but their irradiated descendants were the size of a greyhound in addition. “What exactly did you say about that ‘ _bug spray_ ’, again?” he tried to catch a breath after finally shooting the last one.

“That I have no more,” she reminded him but was moved that he remembered even her meaningless comments, “I ran out of it  _very_  long time ago.”

“I guess it would’ve expired anyway,” he remarked strangely.  _Wait... he believed her!_  “Enough chatter, we've got a job to do,” he short-cutted the topic seeing her jaw dropping open.

The last opposition was a pack of feral mongrels, which were not really a challenge as they kept running in a straight line towards them or stayed at a spot growling in their direction, or tried to bite him through the power armor, so Winter had more than enough time to fill them with lead.

“There it is... ArcJet Systems,” he announced the building and a moment later she saw the top of the building as well, as it slowly appeared from behind the hill they were running up to. His height advantage made it easier for him to spot things over uneven terrain, she had to make note of that for herself. She had several power armors at Sanctuary but never considered it would be any reason to use them daily. She only used them when she had to go against super mutants or she had to hike tall structures, as the frame had an excellent built-in mechanism which absorbed the impact of landing, should she fall.

“There shouldn't be any exterior security, so we'll head in through the front,” Danse discussed his plan with her. “Listen up. We do this clean and quiet. No heroics and by the book. Understood?” By this time they were right in front of the entrance.

“Let's hurry this up,” she replied eagerly, readying her rifle, attempting to go in, but his hand blocked the door.

“I don't plan on rushing through the facility without extreme caution,” he admonished her. “Contrary to what you might believe, I'd like you to remain alive during the course of our mission.” So the paladin had humour, good. That way he might tolerate her attitude better, if he decided to let her join their ranks. “Remember, our primary target is the Deep Range Transmitter,” he repeated needlessly, but it must have been protocol to do so. “Stay focused and check your fire. I don't want to be hit by stray bullets.” She thought he was joking, so she teased back.

“If you stay out of my line of sight, you won’t,” she told him, but he responded with a slow shook of his head, which faded the smile from her face.

As they entered the far-flung lobby, Danse started to berate the pre-war company which used to reside in the building, “It was corporations like this that put the last nail in the coffin for mankind. They exploited technology for their own gains, pocketing the cash and ignoring the damage they'd done.” His voice was somber, she easily believed that he pitied the old world.

“And to think, people were okay with that,” she said to herself, but he overheard it and turned back, so she added, “people before the War were kind of ignorant, you know. Until they could consume as much as they wanted they didn’t care about economy or ecology,” she reprehended the terrible climate of the old society. “This selfish and short-sighted attitude was their undoing, that’s why they’re gone extinct and we are here. Well, you, at least, I'm here out of pure luck,” she concluded and he just stared at her but didn’t say anything, so she signalled, “Let’s go.”

They continued through the ruins, the building was partially collapsed. The outer structure was solid, but the lighter interior decorations gave in already, the remains of the suspended ceiling and the floor tiles from upper levels piled up here and there, completely changing the original floor plans.

“Look at these wrecks,” Danse said as they entered a security area with several protectron charging pods and the remains of the robots scattered around. “It appears as though the facility's automated security's already been dealt with.”

“Looks like we missed the party,” Winter grinned and proceeded to salvage anything useful from the protectrons. She wasn’t unhappy, because sometimes the protectrons malfunctioned and they were quite a pain in close quarters. Especially four at the same time.

“You're making a foolishly hasty assessment,” Danse reprehended her once more.

“No, it’s called humour. I saw you were capable of it,” she snapped back.

“There is a place and time for jokes, but the middle of an op is not that,” he stated sternly. “Look at the evidence. There isn't a single spent ammunition casing or drop of blood in sight. These robots were assaulted by Institute synths.”

“Oh great, fucking Gen-1’s again,” Winter looked up to the ceiling passionately. She hated those synths, the Institute seemed to send those as expendables for the dirty work and there were seemingly unlimited supply of them. They were scary, skeleton-looking pawns with a creepy processed voice, armed with batons and energy weapons.

“I suppose you already fought synths then?” he took on the opportunity to get information out of her.

“More than enough times. The first-gens, the skeletal ones, arrive in great numbers, but are easy to destroy, because they often don’t have armor or even plating,” she shared her knowledge with him. “They can be bothersome because the numbers, but they go down after the first hit usually. Just don’t let them too close, they are stronger than they seem and their batons are usually electrified. Quite painful if you ask me,” she frowned remembering her last encounter with a shock baton. “The second-gens, which look like mannequins, are more resilient, but they are vulnerable to limb damage. If a headshot doesn’t put them down, shoot them in the leg, that’ll give you some time.” He nodded, acknowledging what she said without further ado. He either knew it already, or had nothing to respond.

“And for our sake, let’s hope there won’t be any Coursers here,” she sighed, remembering the ones she saw earlier and the tales certain friends shared with her. She even saw one in a vision, that one looked professional and she wouldn’t want to face him if the tales were true. The whole memory terrified her, the cold, stringent, emotionless voice as it came to the mercenary with the Institute's orders then took her son with him.

“What is a Courser?” he inquired.

“Literal killing machines, but human looking ones. They are faster, stronger, allegedly smarter than humans, have high-tech armor and weaponry, and tend to use stealth boys in combat,” she passed him the information she gathered about them.

“It seems you know more about these abominations than I did,” he noted and even through the distorted speakers she heard that he was astonished but she spotted some uncertainty in his voice.

"It sounds like you're scared of synths," she remarked timidly, although she was not entirely sure she’s right.

"There's a measurable difference between being frightened and being prepared,” he differentiated between the two. “Now... let's move out.”

The further rooms were devoid of synths, as they slowly explored the facility, room by room. Most of the doors were inaccessible due to the debris, but for every cave-in there was a destroyed wall in return, through which they could continue.

“This place is a mess, but I still see a few pieces of salvage that the Brotherhood might be interested in,” he remarked, unveiling some about their operations, “After we're done here I'll have to mark this place for sweep and retrieve.”

“Sweep and retrieve?” she asked about.

“It means a standard operation, when Scribes pack everything valuable while a squad of Knights watch their backs,” he told her, trying to make it as simple as he could, “then they return with the tech and documents to the base.”

“Sounds exciting,” she told him but he shook his head.

“Maybe for the Scribes it is,” he muttered under his nose. “I had my share of it when I was a Knight and believe me, it was boring,” he spoke up.

“I like exploration better,” he added, “that’s why I signed up for recon duty.”

They entered a fairly large room, which appeared to be a security checkpoint before entering the core. The walls were lined with workstations, she spotted several terminals, some of them still worked.

“See if you can find a way to get that door open,” he pointed at a door. “I'm going to reconnoiter the area,” he assigned the tasks for both of them.

“Okay,” she looked around for anything promising, but ultimately settled down at the terminal in the middle of the room. She tried to hack it, but ran out of attempts and the terminal locked her out.

While she waited for the next try, she initiated conversation, “Do you think I would be a Scribe? I know a thing or two about pre-war technology,” she chattered as she looked around for holotapes, keys or anything helpful.

“That doesn’t necessarily mean that you would make a good Scribe. Affinity for tech is a con for every member of the Brotherhood. I’d like you to be a field soldier, to be honest.”

“You mean a Knight?” she tried to see their rank system clearly.

“Eventually, but I’m not allowed to promote you to that rank, only an Elder can do that. You’d first be an Initiate,” he told her and she nodded acknowledging what he said.

It turned out that to access the deeper areas of the facility the employees used to authenticate themselves with a password. She needed an existing employee name to accompany the password, so she looked around. She found a second terminal, where she was able to generate a new password for ‘Mr. Archer’, who most likely didn’t mind the misuse of his name. She went back to the first terminal, typed in the credentials. “We’re in,” she announced proudly, but as the door promptly opened up all hell broke loose. About half dozen synths opened fire at them, the premise was lit by light blue energy beams.

“Multiple synth targets... take 'em down!” Danse yelled needlessly, entering the fray and turning the enemies to glowing red ash piles or oddly collapsed scrap heaps. He was true to his word and didn’t show any sign of fear as he advanced forward in the crossfire and eliminated them one by one. She took cover behind the desk, and tried to aim with her rifle, but the Paladin blocked her sight through the door, so she got closer. She managed to shoot about the third of the synths. When the last Gen-1 collapsed on the floor she started to collect the fusion cells from them. These had white coating unlike the pre-war ones, which were yellow, but luckily the two were compatible with each other. She plucked them to a sack and pulled out a thin rope from her bag and threaded the Institute weapons by their trigger guards together.

“I’d just leave that if I were you,” he remarked, “but I have to admit, you are resourceful,” he added in an amused tone.

“I’m going to arm my settlers with these,” she explained to him, “or I’ll scrap them for fiber optics.”


	8. Chapter 8

The same pattern repeated in several more rooms; synths attacked them, they were eliminated, Winter salvaged weapons and ammo and Danse reprehended the enemy with phrases like, “Damn synths have compromised most of the facility.”

“You seem to hate these synths just like me,” Winter noted casually, after about the twentieth rifle she added to her collection. She couldn’t carry more, but the amount will do for a while.

“They're an abuse of technology created by the Institute,” Danse responded passionately, “Abominations meant to "improve" upon humanity. It's unacceptable. They simply can't be allowed to exist.”

Winter had more than half year to develop her opinion about synths, but she still felt ambivalent feelings towards them. Ever since she met the first Gen-1, which opened fire at her without provocation, she hated the first two generations, and decimated their numbers whenever she had the opportunity. The Gen-3s however were a difficult subject. She agreed with the Paladin that they shouldn’t exist - but they did nonetheless.

“What’s the Brotherhood’s viewpoint about the third-gens?” she asked him curiously. The third-gens didn’t ask for the life, the human-like characteristics and free will they were granted, but Winter wasn’t sure that the Brotherhood cared about differentiating the generations or the feelings of machines.

“Immediate termination,” he confirmed her suspicions. “A machine should not have free will,” he ranted, “and if it looks like a real human, even worse.”

She had friends who would be rather unhappy about his answer, but she kept it to herself. She tried to imagine what Glory would say in response to him, but she didn’t know her well enough yet to tell that. She was one of the first synths she met, at least what she know of, and definitely the first one who bragged about it. The only, to be exact. Most third-gens either willingly had their memories wiped and didn’t remember their origins, or worked for the Institute, undercover and also didn’t advertised their true nature. The only synth everyone seemed to know, accept and even admire was working as a detective in Diamond City.

“Not all synths work for the Institute,” she started tentatively, because she wanted to learn more. “Some decide to escape,” she feeded him with some morsels, careful not to reveal too much about anything. “They say that they have their memories wiped, to start a new life,” she concluded the unpopular opinion around the Commonwealth.

“Are you referring to the Railroad?” he asked indignantly.

“Yes,” she admitted and counter-attacked, “you heard about them?”

“I was told to keep an eye out, but they are not primary interest currently,” he unfolded more than enough. If she joins the Brotherhood, she will have to be very cautious about her role in the Railroad. She understood that the two organizations were inherently opposing each other, but she saw a promising aspect in the Brotherhood, so she decided to stay on the good side of them for now. Helping to escape and start a new life for third generation synths was a noble cause and deep inside she felt good for helping every synth, but it certainly didn’t advance the life of the average Commonwealth citizen, either human, ghoul or synth. Even if she weren’t the General of the Minutemen she would try to do something to make the world a more liveable place, if not matching, but thriving to be as peaceful as it was before the bombs. “Remain vigilant,” he interrupted her train of thoughts, “we've got turrets ahead.”

“How many?” she asked because she didn’t want to face more than two at a time.

“Four,” he said and released a short burst of shots before taking cover until the turrets bombarded the corridor with laser beams, “three.”

“I’ll look around, stay here,” she said and entered a remarkably intact premise which looked like a server room. It must have been fortified to bear the weight of the racks. Near the end of it she found the terminal which controlled the internal security and after a quick password-hacking, she disabled the turrets, causing an abrupt silence. She peeked out on the second door of the room, which opened to the same corridor after a left-turn and saw the turrets mounted high above her, offline. “All clear,” she called out and saw him emerging from behind the corner.

“I have to admit, I’m impressed,” he commended her with a sizeable nod, before he faced the corridor ahead, pointing his rifle at the door at the end, "Engine Core's ahead. Should be our final stop."

“About damn time,” she growled, “I’m nearing my carrying capacity already.”

“I highly recommend dropping some of that,” he suggested but Winter shook her head.

“No, I won’t pay for something what I can acquire for free,” and tapped at her makeshift weapon-cluster before trying to swing it to her back, but it was oversized and hard to handle, so it returned to it previous state. He just shook his head in disapproval but didn’t advance the topic.

As they entered the core she had to switch her Pip-Boy to flashlight mode, because she couldn’t see a thing. The power was out in this part of the building and the only light was coming from the emergency lights. The core was a sizeable, oblong chamber, with a slowly descending scaffolding leading up and down around the last jet engine which was hanged in the middle of the premise. It was better lit than the corridors because of the roof windows.

“Look at this place. Scribes would have a field day in here,” he remarked, looking all the way down below, then up the engine again, before pointing to a monitoring window high above them. “The transmitter should be in the control room at the top of the core but it looks like the elevators are dead.” Of course the engineers designed and alternative to elevators, but the scaffolding leading up was partially collapsed and she wouldn’t risk to jump up there. Paladin Danse must have had the same conclusion, because he suggested, “We'll have to keep heading down for now and find a way to get the facility's power back online.”

“Do you think it has any?” she asked as they paced down.

“It seems logical for a facility of this magnitude,” he guessed, seemingly more from experience rather than actual intel about the site and his next addition strengthened her opinion when they reached the bottom, "there  _has to be_  a power backup system somewhere. Scout the maintenance area off of the main chamber. I'll remain here and watch our backs."

She looked around the place and found a quite long corridor leading to a minor generator room in the back where she found a switch. She flipped it up and the power returned promptly, the core was lit up, with pale blue energy beams accompanying the pre-war lighting setup. Once again they were ambushed and she cursed under her breath because she was behind an observation window and she knew her bullets wouldn’t get through the safety glass. She saw as dozens of synths relayed in the core, and started to rain on the Paladin, posing a notable challenge for him. They came quicker than he was able to evaporate them.

“Don’t just stand there,” he snapped at her when he noticed her watching the fight. She dropped her burden next to a strange weapon on a table and ran back all along the corridor to aid him. She tried to aim with her rifle, but the distance just wasn’t enough. “Hostile life sign detected,” a synth announced that it spotted her and promptly three Institute pistol started to bombard her with their irritating energy blasts. She took cover behind a corner, and switched to her pistol. Remembering where they were, she leaned from cover and shot two of them from memory, missing the third, which surprised her by charging at her with its baton. She managed to take it down, but it made little difference, as another batch of them arrived with a loud and blinding white beam, zapping out of nowhere. She continued to shoot but she couldn’t get closer to the Paladin. He slowly circled around the room and when he was at the opposite side of the chamber and saw her at her cover in the corridor, he cried out, “this doesn’t help. Go back,” he hit a synth with the stock of his rifle, “do something!”

“What?” she asked back and filled some synths with bullets.

He had to step back again to avoid being flanked, “I don’t know! Push buttons,” he shot another one, and desperately added, “...anything! Synth scum,” he growled as he knocked down another one which came to close to him.

Winter grabbed her rifle and ran back to the room with the observing window. She saw a control panel there, with several smaller controls and a large, ominous red button, labeled ‘fire engine’. She looked up and saw that the Paladin was almost cornered and more synths rained down at him, after another white flash. “There’s too many of them,”he remarked with wrath. She wondered for a moment how well the power armor can withstand the heat wave coming from the jet engine, and flipped the safety lid open, hovering her hand above the large red button for a moment, because all her previous experience taught her to have a reasonable fear to give it a try. Even if that fear was irrational as it came from her childhood cartoons.

“Improvise, Winter!” he ordered in despair, breathing heavily after the long minutes of continuous combat and she pushed her palm at the button at last, adding her own weight to the thrust. A pre-recorded female voice announced that everyone should leave the main chamber, and after a five seconds countdown the engine fired. She watched in awe as the synths around evaporated in a matter of seconds, all at once and the heat wave forced the Paladin to his knees as well. His armor got so hot it started to faintly glow. She picked up her luggage once again and she ran back to assess him, possibly to give him a stimpak if he needs one.

“Oh my god. I’m sorry! Oh god, are you alright?” she was shocked that she almost fried him, despite her best intentions. She didn’t know what would she say to Haylen. Or to the permanently pissed off Rhys.

“Got... cooked by those flames,” he answered slightly in pain as he slowly got up, “but... thanks to my power armor I'm still in one piece. The important thing is that we're still alive... and we have a way to get to the transmitter. Let's go,” he beckoned her, seemingly not angered by the fact he almost died a minute ago. Or maybe he was used to the danger?

They took the elevator to the top floor and none of them was surprised by another wave of gen-ones attacking them in the control room. Finally, it seemed that the reinforcements ran out as there wasn’t anymore coming and they eventually managed to dispose them all.

“Damn it,” he growled as he reconnoitered the room, “I don't see the device anywhere. Fan out and check the synth remains,” he draw a circle in the air with his gun. “They may have been after the transmitter as well,” he guessed.

Winter spotted a gen-two across the room, so she headed to see that one first. In the groups of synths a higher generation one usually acted as a leader, so it was logical to see that one first. She found a strange, Institute-issue holding container near its hand. She picked the white box up and peeled the plastic crate open, holding up a dark brown device with some potmeters and others parts she couldn’t even name, “is this it?”

The Paladin strided from across the room to see better and he finally nodded, “yes. Good job. Let’s take the service elevator to the surface,” he recommended and he tucked back the transmitter to the plastic holder. It had a comfortable grip, so she decided to use it. The elevator took them down to an annex of the main building. Danse checked out the corners, "The bunker looks clear. Let's move out." Surrounded by fences, a cliff and the building itself the backyard looked safe enough to talk. “Well, that could have gone smoother, but mission accomplished,” he started to evaluate their mission as they walked out.

“Smoother?” she asked as she caught up with him and adjusted her cumbrance. “I thought we did fine.”

“That sweep was sloppy,” he shook his head again and Winter already stopped counting how many times she made him do it. He removed his helmet before continuing, “We were caught unprepared more than once, which is unacceptable,” he furrowed his brows for a moment, but raised them in no time, “However, your extra gun gave us the edge we needed. I'm not certain I could have accomplished the mission alone.” Either she did well or he was modest, she couldn’t decide.

“I thought we worked well as a team,” she smiled at him.

“Agreed,” he nodded friendly. “It's a refreshing change to work with a civilian who can follow orders properly,” he commended her and she felt elevated from the compliment. Even if the order means to fry your commander alive.

“That being said, I believe we have two important matters to discuss. First and foremost, if you'll hand me the Deep Range Transmitter, I'd like to compensate you for your assistance during this operation,” he held out his hand.

“Here you go,” and she placed the plastic box with the transmitter safely encapsulated inside to his sizeable palm.

“Thank you,” he clasped at it carefully with the stout fingers and in turn, he handed her his gun, “I think you'll find this weapon useful. It's my own personal modification of the standard Brotherhood Laser Rifle. May it serve you well in battle.” Did he just handed his personal weapon over to her?

“Don't you need to keep it?” she asked blankly, examining the weapon she just received. It was an AER9 laser rifle, military issue, without a scope. She already found some laser guns, but she didn't really give them a chance. That may change.

“This isn't the only weapon at my disposal. Brotherhood soldiers always carry a backup,” he explained to her and she nodded gratefully.

“Well, thanks,” she grinned and tested the weapon on a nearby tree, “works nice.” It was precise. She tried again, but now she used her Pip-Boy too, and turned on the Vault-Tec Assisted Targetic System, or V.A.T.S. for short and aimed at the tree again. There was something magical in the connection between the Pip-Boy and the weapon, which provided her a better use together. "Very nice!" As she looked at the bottom she noticed a little handwritten sticker on it, ‘Righteous Authority’. It seemed a good idea to mark your weapons to differentiate between them, but she never came this far to write their name on them, even though she named her most favourite weapons too.

“Now... as far as the second matter goes, I wanted to make you a proposal,” he continued, snapping her out of admiring the laser rifle. “We had a lot thrown at us back there. Our op could have ended in disaster, but you kept your cool and handled it like a soldier,” he commended her once again and she already grinned wildly because she knew where this was leading. “Before we departed from the police station, you told me you wanted to join the Brotherhood of Steel. Is that something you're still willing to do, or should we just say our goodbyes?”

Winter understood that things got real, so she took a moment before answering, and asked about the conditions, “What would be expected of me if I joined?” Joining a new group always had its advantages and disadvantages, and even though she still knew very little about the Brotherhood of Steel, it didn’t seem like a good choice to turn down this offer.

“You'd be under my command, and I'd expect you to follow orders. No more mercenary work... this is the real thing. You'd have access to advanced military weapons, as well as your own personal suit of Power Armor. Most importantly, you'd have the Brotherhood at your back... ready to spill its own blood to keep you alive. So... what do you say?”

Winter cleared her throat and hit a respectful tone, “I'd be honored to join.”

“That's what I wanted to hear,” he responded with a confident smile. “Meet me back at the police station, and we'll discuss the details. Dismissed, Initiate,” he added with a straight face and she savoured the sound of it.  _Initiate Winter_. No, that wasn’t good, it called for a real name.  _Initiate Irwin, then._

When he saw that she was just standing around, he interrupted her train of thoughts, “report back to the police station, Scribe Haylen is waiting for you. I'll be there soon, just need to survey the area for technology,” he added.

“I need to hop into Graygarden with all this stuff, it's just on the way,” she tapped at her loot again, “but I’ll be there soon,” she promised and took a few steps towards Cambridge. Before she could get too far, she realized she forgot one thing. She didn’t address his superior with the necessary respect. “If that’s acceptable, Sir.”

“Very well, but don’t take long,” he urged her, “we need to discuss a lot of things. Ad Victoriam, soldier.” 

“Ad Victoriam, Sir,” she tried to copy the salute and turned around, readying her pistol. She looked forward to see her favourite gardener robots again.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back in Cambridge, Winter fills the application papers and finds something unexpected.  
> And we get a glimpse of a certain man with steel-grey eyes.
> 
>  
> 
> **This is an old, unedited chapter. I'll gradually update and split the chapters as I get thought them.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a hard time to decide which title would be better this or 'Fancy Lads.' Thought I'd add that.

Graygarden was one of the most scenic settlements in the Commonwealth, situated on a hillside, surrounded by cliffs. The focal point of the settlement was a huge greenhouse, which endured the past two centuries remarkably well. It was a pre-war gardening experiment, still running effectively, thanks to the hard work of a dozen Mr. Handy robots, which were the only occupants, safe for the two provisioners.

Not far from it was the original owner’s homestead, just across the railway. The remains of the old highway, which once provided easy access between places still dominated the area, even though it was partially collapsed just south of Graygarden. To the other direction it was mostly intact however, running past Cambridge and spanning far to Lexington. When Winter first arrived here she was scouting the area from the relative safety of the elevated surface, sniping enemies from above. She would’ve had problems getting down from there if she haven’t found a power armor frame on the higher level, which made it possible to simply jump down. Since she didn’t need it, she left the frame here. She knew she should transport it to somewhere safer, to avoid it being lifted by raiders. Fusion cores were uncommon, but some raider gangs still possessed makeshift, post-war power armors, and she didn’t want this one to end up like that as well.

Her eyes wandered to a white robot hovering at the chemistry station and her thoughts shifted from the frame to CVRIE, a Miss Nanny unit she found in Vault 81. Curie, for short. She was the most interesting robot she ever met, they travelled together for a few weeks, her personality was a pleasant change after her previous companions.

She had to tell her something important.

“Hey, Curie, how do you do?” she greeted her. The robot was distilling something, Winter guessed. The various beakers were filled with the condensed, lilac liquid she produced.

“You’ve returned,” she chirped happily. Winter believed that robots can experience feelings, maybe not the same way humans did, but they did. “There’s no one to talk of meaningful matters here,” she complained.

“What are you doing?” Winter asked her, pointing to the vials.

“I tested the properties of the mutfruit plant, but I haven’t found anything extraordinary yet,” she concluded. “That one is juice, if you are thirsty,” she gestured towards a fairly large bottle with one of her limbs.

“Wee, thanks,” Winter grinned and smelled the slurry purple substance. “I haven’t drunk juice in two hundred years.” She took a sip of it. It was fantastic.

“Have you found someone that can help me become human?” she chattered lightheartedly, but Winter knew it was very important to her. She believed the task was impossible, until she visited the Memory Den.

“Doctor Amari may be able to help.” If anyone was well versed with machine/human interfaces, it was her. “This is delicious,” she noted when she swallowed more than half or the nectar already.

“Then we must see this doctor. At once. Please,” Curie pleaded her and started to rinse and clean the vials, packing away the beaker stands.

“I need to pop in to Cambridge, but if you don’t mind the delay, come with me,” she suggested.

“Wonderful! I would request we travel extensively and collect data,” she said eagerly as she always did. Her scientific curiosity was unmatched.

 

Theresa and her friend Daisy were enjoying some light cocktails in one of the bars in Cambridge, which was on the edge of the service they could afford and quality they accepted. Being before graduation they were limited in terms of fluidity, so they settled with this catering unit which was some distance from the campus and happened to be close to the local police department.

“I say that he’s eyeing you!” her friend tried to convince her once again.

“No way,” she glanced at her and shook her head in disbelief.

Not far from the women’s table sat two men. One of them was a police officer, Theresa saw him patrolling the streets of Cambridge earlier. He wasn’t particularly Theresa’s case, but he was all right in his own way. He had long dark hair, restrained into a ponytail and small, dark eyes.

“Yes he does,” she persevered with a fierce glare.

The other man was jackpot. He was tall, muscular, and had the most marvellous skull structure she ever saw. Everything about him screamed he was a soldier, not that she minded it.

“You’re seeing things,” Theresa declared categorically. Whenever she looked over the other table, she only saw the cop looking at her. More than once she caught him staring and snatching his gaze away hastily, while she seeked eye contact with his friend. She didn’t bother to look at them again this time.

“No, really,” Daisy shook her head and Theresa took a slip of her drink. “Here he comes,” she looked above her shoulder.

Theresa managed to swallow the mouthful just in time, “what?” She turned around and he was really heading towards their table.

“Good evening, ladies,” he greeted them with a pleasant deep tone. Damn, he looked even better this close, with his steel blue eyes and his soldier-cut. She _might_ even pardon him his stubbles.

“Uh, hello handsome,” Daisy cooed back, and Theresa wanted to kick her ankle for that. She was popular among men, and not once she scrounged guys she was interested in before she could even act. But she can’t have this man, she won’t back away now.

“Good evening,” she produced a warm smile as she fully turned her face towards their visitor.

“My friend over there,” he looked back to their table where she saw the cop palming his face, “would like to offer you a drink,” he looked at Theresa with raised brows at the word ‘you’, “but he is a little shy,” he smiled pandering. “I came here on his behalf. Would you mind to accompany us at our table?” he gestured towards their table, inviting them. What she considered most important, he just asked her to join him. Other factors were irrelevant.

“Sure, why not?” she agreed after a momentary delay, because she didn’t want to seem cheap, “Daisy?” Theresa took advantage of the situation. It was evident that she caught the cop’s eye, but she hoped to stir his friend here up instead. She picked up her glass and stood up.

“Gladly,” she agreed, of course she did.

“Wonderful!” he seemed slightly relieved that he didn’t fail, and stepped back to grant them enough room. “After you, please.” He was polite too, neat.

“Hello,” she smiled at the policeman who smiled back, trying to hide his nervousness as she sat down facing him, without asking. Soon Daisy took the chair on her left and their inviter came around his friend to sat back to his place.  

“Ladies,” the black haired guy addressed them meekly and his friend just rolled his eyes.

“My friend is Nate, I’m Roger,” he introduced themselves, showing him how he should’ve done, then continued the around the table counter clockwise, “this beauty here is Daisy and her friend is…” he stopped at looked at her, waiting for her name. She could get used to those steely eyes scanning her features as he waits to her answers.

“Oh, I’m Theresa,” she helped him out with a warm smile.

“What’s your poison, Theresa?” Nate asked and she had to shift her gaze from the steely eyes to the coaly pair. She can’t be sure because the bar was dimly lit, but Nate had the deepest black irises she ever saw. She believed she could lose herself in them if she looked long enough, so she looked down to her almost empty glass to avoid that. There was something in his eyes that made her feel uneasy. He was handsome in his way too, though he wasn’t as masculine as Roger. To compensate he grew a mustache, but lacked beard. She never understood why men decided to sport only one type of hair on their face, either over or under their mouth, if they could do both.

“Hm, a nice cocktail would do fine, thanks,” she accepted his offer. She considered accepting one drink wouldn’t hurt. She can still politely turn him down later. “Maybe a Nuka-Scotch?”

Nate’s eyes grew large for a moment, his face coated in silent appreciation, “That’s a strong one.”

“Don’t worry about me,” she assured him with a confident smile. “I can handle myself.”

“All right then,” he conceded.

 

“Knight Rhys, I request admittance, sir,” she tried to hit the most formal and most polite tone she was able. The blue doors quickly opened, revealing the puzzled face of Rhys inside, staring at her.

“Where’s Paladin Danse?” he asked suspiciously.

“He stayed behind to survey the area for technology, sir,” she answered, and even though she didn’t exactly knew what that meant, Rhys nodded acknowledging it.

“Why are you calling me ‘sir’, all of a sudden?” he asked incredulously.

“Protocol requires it, does it not?” she asked back rhetorically.

“Ah, you’re back,” she heard Haylen’s voice, and a moment later she emerged from behind a wall. Once again she was grateful for her interruption.

“Yes, ma’am,” Winter replied with a smile, not sure if she needed to call her like that.

Haylen smiled back friendly. “Ready to fill those papers?” she asked to which Winter nodded.

“What the hell are you two talking about?” Rhys switched his eyes between the two women, but they just chuckled, making him scowl in anger. At the same moment she opened her mouth to explain everything, they heard the familiar thuds of power armor approaching. Danse appeared from behind the garage seconds later and looked at the commotion, slightly raising his brows. “You made it back, good. Let's head inside.”

“Paladin Danse... glad to see you alive and well, sir,” Haylen greeted him warmly. Winter suppressed her grimace. _That’s what I promised, Haylen._

“Are we in luck, sir?” Rhys pried about.

“Mission accomplished,” he announced ceremonially and showed the white plastic container up, “we have the transmitter.”

“Finally... some good news for a change. Nice work, sir,” Rhys said enthusiastically.

“I didn't do it alone. Had some help from our new friend,” he commended her. Meanwhile he reached the top of the stairs, towering above everyone. “And this robot?” he looked at the Miss Nanny unit wonderingly.

“My designation is _Contagions Vulnerability Robotic Infirmary Engineer_. Or Curie,” she introduced herself, and Winter checked their reactions. Haylen seemed the most curious about her, of course. She believed the two would be able discuss medicine for long hours.

“I ask permission for my friend to enter the base, sir,” she looked at the Paladin.

“Granted,” he nodded and headed in, passing by his subordinates, followed by Winter and Curie. Danse placed his helmet and rifle on the reception desk, next to the transmitter. He turned around and saw all eyes were on him, so he started, “Haylen, Rhys… it's time to welcome our newest recruit to the recon team,” he announced Winter’s membership. “She shows a lot of promise, and with the proper guidance, I think she has the potential of becoming one of the best.” The last part surprised Winter, she didn’t know what did she do to deserve it.

“You don't have to prove anything else to me. Getting the transmitter was enough,” Haylen said cheerily. She looked forward working with her already.

“So you decided to stay, huh? I expected you to take your payment and run,” Rhys admitted wide-eyed.

“One cannot be always right,” she agreed, “You upset that I'm staying?”

“Maybe,” he said suspiciously. “You need to prove that you aren't gonna put a round in my back the minute I turn around,” he folded his arms before his chest.

“You need to do more than insulting me for that,” she remarked dryly.

“That's enough, both of you,” Danse interrupted them like a thunderstorm. “Like it or not, you're going to have to learn to work together,” he rebuked them slightly calmer and turned to face Winter. “You need to understand what it means to be a part of the Brotherhood,” he started to lecture her, sounding like when they first met. “We're not soldiers of fortune. We're an army and we've dedicated our lives to uphold a strict code of ethics. If you intend to stay within our ranks, you need to obey our tenets without question.”

“I’d like to learn more about this "code of ethics”, she submitted herself.

“If you were paying attention in ArcJet, you should have learned some of it already,” he remarked somewhat irritated. “The rest will become apparent as you spend time with your fellow soldiers,” he said and looked at Haylen and Rhys, indicating them to be examples, before restoring eye contact with her. She swallowed as his stern gaze scanned her face. “I only ask for two things from anyone under my command. Honesty and respect. You fall in line, you stay in line. I give you an order, and you follow it,” he furrowed his brows for a moment at this part, “It's as simple as that. Now, before I release you to Haylen and Rhys for your assignments, there's one last order of business. From this moment forward, I'm granting you the rank of Initiate,” he lowered his tone as he finished his tirade.

“Thank you, sir,” Winter acknowledged quickly, feeling that now is not the time to test his nerves.

“Ad Victoriam, Initiate,” Haylen was first to salute, welcoming her to the order.

“She doesn't even know what that means, Haylen,” Rhys shook his head disapprovingly.

“I beg to differ, Knight. It means ‘to victory’,” she defended herself and Rhys’ jaw dropped. It wasn’t a coincidence she ended up working as a lawyer. “I didn’t spend years learning latin to be told I can’t understand a simple ablative case,” she ranted for a little, only because it felt good.

“Outstanding, soldier,” Danse remarked, already over his ire. “In our eyes, defeat is unacceptable because we're fighting for the future of mankind. Our rallying cry is more powerful than any weapon you could ever carry. Remember that,” he heartened her. “Haylen, I need you to start working on the radio as soon as you can,” he issued an order to Haylen.

“Yes, sir,” she replied and he went to talk with Rhys about his medical condition, perimeter security and similar things.

Haylen reached for the application papers and handed them to Winter. “I believe you can fill these in by yourself,” she gazed at her with emerald eyes suggestively.

“Are there applicants who can’t?” Winter asked agaze.

“Literacy is not elementary anymore, you hail from a more sophisticated era,” she noted ruefully. Winter looked over the form, it was quite simple.

“That is terrible, literacy is very important,” Curie remarked in a shocked tone.

“I keep forgetting that, Haylen,” she suspired and held up the papers, “I can manage it, thanks.”

“Good,” she concluded and picked up the transmitter to examine it, “see me when you are done or if you have any questions.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I never in my life used radio, especially not in English, so I did a lot of research but I have no idea if it good or not.  
> Also, the Brotherhood's weird fascination with old things like latin is... well it exists, so I tried to roll with it.


	10. Chapter 10

Winter picked up Haylen’s ballpoint pen and headed to the old office area. She wanted to sit at Nate’s old desk, so she started to clear the debris from its vicinity. It was in the farthest corner of the office, so it was buried under quite some rubble. It took several minutes until she could put the papers down.

“There are plenty of other tables all around,” Rhys remarked behind her. His appearing startled her a bit. She glanced at him, the Knight was leaning to the wall, watching her.

“I want to sit at this one, sir,” she answered with a grave tone.

“I can see that,” he huffed with rolling eyes. “Why?”

“This was… my husband’s desk. Long time ago,” she answered in a shaking voice, which reflected her inner struggle.

“Yeah, sure,” he said but he didn’t push the topic further.

Winter tried to open the desk drawer, but it was locked. Her heart pounded at the realization that it might have been Nate who locked it and it could have been sealed ever since. She produced a bobby pin from her haversack. She had a handful of them in a box for the times when she needed to make sure to open a lock. She proceeded to pick the lock, trying to ignore the prying eyes behind her.

Just as she inserted the pin, she froze for a moment, wondering what Nate would think of her now, a scavenger picking a police officer’s table in a police department, right next to the chief officer’s room. She chuckled at the situation, then she convinced herself if anyone has had any right to see what was inside the drawer it was her.

“All right, out with it... what's your game?” Rhys hit an irritated tone.

“Game? What do you mean?” she asked back slightly annoyed because he disturbed her concentration.

“I can usually size people up at a glance,” he told her and relocated himself closer to her, “but you... you're different. And it's bugging the heck out of me.” Winter broke the bobby pin into the lock. “You're not the military type, you're a loner,” Rhys continued and she managed to winkle it out, among muttered curses. “So I can't figure out why you're sticking around,” he added, completely ignoring that his mere presence bothered her. “You got what you wanted, so why don't you hit the road?” he finally bit out what he wanted.

Winter looked him in the eyes and said, “the Brotherhood might be the best chance I'll ever have to find my son.” Rhys flinched at her sudden matter-of-course attitude.

“Well, as far as reasons go, that's a pretty good one,” he admitted. “Look, I'm going to cut you some slack because Danse trusts you. But if you step out of line and put any of my brothers or sisters in danger, I'll make sure you regret it,” he growled threateningly and she wasn’t surprised by it. She was a new variable in the picture, he had every right to be suspicious about her.

“Fair enough,” she acknowledged his speech without advancing it any further. “Now that we settled it, excuse me, sir,” she said, hoping that he caught her meaning to leave her alone.

“Whatever, scavver,” he snorted and limped out to the lobby. His leg condition was better every day. Once he was back on hit feet, things will be easier around here.

Sorting the distraction out, she got the exact angle, “sweet,” and the lock clicked. She hesitated to look inside, afraid what she might find inside. Maybe nothing was in it, maybe it was decayed beyond recognition. She slowly pulled the drawer to examine its content. Under uninteresting, work-related papers she found a few things. There was his service 10mm pistol, she quickly tucked it in her bag, not to give Rhys the wrong impression, should he decide to come back. Next to it lain a box of cigars, what Nate mentioned he planned to give to Chief O’Neill for Christmas. Under it she found two envelopes. One of them had two movie tickets inside. The date was ‘11-03-2077, 20:00’, their anniversary but she couldn’t make out the title of the movie, not that it mattered anymore. Nate wanted to take her to see a movie, that would have been their first night out since Shaun was born. “Oh, Nate, darling,” she sighed and a tear rolled down her cheek, almost dropping into the drawer. She wiped her face and looked into the other envelope, discovering some photos and her heart pounded even harder. She didn’t anticipate to find this much at all.

The prints aged a little, but the sealed environment preserved them enough so the faces were still recognizable on them. The first was her portrait, her then black hair tied up to an elegant bun, facing the camera with the vitiligo free side of her face, sporting a radiant smile. On the second Nate smiled happily holding the newborn Shaun in his arms. It was taken when they arrived home from the hospital, their very first father-and-son picture. _I will found Shaun, Honey, I promise_. Several more baby pictures of Shaun followed and her heart tightened at the thought that she missed her son’s childhood. Her last information suggested that he was some ten years old. He most likely didn’t even remember her.

The last pictures were taken at their wedding, one showed her in her wedding dress, another one dancing with Nate and yet another one with their friend Roger, all three smiling happily. She was glad that she had some decent pictures of her late husband, because the ones they had home decayed into unrecognizable pieces of papers. His eyes were strikingly black and happy, that’s how she wanted to remember him, not filled with horror as the Institute bastards stole his son. She put the tickets and photos back to the envelopes and carefully slid them into a folder she carried for organizing such documents.

 

“You know, I’m flattered by your attention, but I asked you to join us for Nate’s sake,” Roger hummed in her ear as they slowly moved together to the rhythms. He strictly kept his hand on her waist, careful not to move it by an inch neither up or down.

“That’s a pity,” she leaned closer to his ear, “I mean, he’s handsome, but,” she stopped for a moment, gathering courage, “well, do _you_ mind it?” There was enough alcohol in her bloodstream to ask him uninhibited. She wondered why did he even agree to dance, but was grateful nonetheless.

“It’s not exactly that,” he said and smiled bitterly.

“But?” she pressed on, turning the word to a long arch.

“I’m not looking for anyone right now,” he looked in her eyes, in hopes to finish this conversation already, but Theresa had different plans.

“What a shame,” she grimaced and stroked his shoulder to show her intentions. He caught it, sighing wearily.

“If you happened to meet me twelve years ago, I wouldn't have any objections,” he admitted and she considered this a leap forward.

“There are several laws against that, most of them involve long years in prison,” she riddled him and his jaw dropped.

“What?”

“Twelve years ago I was playing with dolls, and I considered boys disgusting,” she gave him clues and felt him tensing up under the implication.

“God,” he stammered, “I meant your current look,” his mouth suddenly drying and his cheeks reddening.

“Hey, it was just a joke, relax, soldier,” she stroked his shoulder once again, trying to soothe him. ”Do you have someone then?” That was the only acceptable reason behind his ambivalence.

“Yes,” he admitted.

“Serious?” she asked back and stopped her hands. If he was about to end a relationship, she was eager to wait, but if he was infatuated to someone, she respected that.

“You could say that,” he said and she didn’t miss the hesitation in his eyes. _Her chance._ Something troubled him and she managed to put the finger on.

“She’s permanent,” she probed.

“Nothing’s permanent, Theresa,” he looked at her troubled and she was confused. His actions and words seemed to contradict each other.

“What does that mean?” she asked, trying to see clear.

“It means that I’m not looking, but I’m not blind either,” he smiled at her faintly and she couldn’t decode the expression in his eyes. At least he -sort of- admitted he found her attractive.

“I like a challenge,” she flashed her eyes at him, suggestively.

“I didn’t mean to encourage you,” he shook his head and stepped away, breaking their intimate stance. “I’m taken. Nothing more to talk about now.”

But Theresa only cared about the last word. _Now_.

 

Haylen finished preparing the transmitter, so she and Danse went up to the roof to install the transmitter. Winter started to fill her application while they were gone. She answered everything honestly, chuckling at the absurdity of the whole situation. Now it was up to the Brotherhood if they believed the data. It was clearly a post-war form, the first part asked about personal details, but it covered more interesting questions as she proceeded further, like radiation exposure, weapon training, and similar post-war things. It was seemingly standard and official, but compared to the pre-war blanks it looked simplified, moreover naive. When she finished, she put the form and the pen back to Haylen’s desk. Rhys glanced at it and snorted, “you misspelled your year of birth.”

“Wish I had,” she noted and he furrowed his brows.

“Nonsense, you can’t be that old,” he said, but his voice ringed with confusion. Winter knew that Haylen tried to convince them when she was away, and Danse was already willing to believe her.

“Nothing makes sense since the bombs fell, Knight,” she looked at him and showed him her driver’s licence to settle it once and for all. It was her only ID which was still readable, complete with a photograph. He examined the card, trying to decide if it was fake and looked up at her, “my hair wasn’t always gray, of course,” she added with a sad smile.

His jaw dropped and he tried hard to find any other difference between the two, but he failed. He handed it back blinking, “how?”

“I was on ice since the Great War,” she mused.

“You were hibernated?” he asked aback, trying to clarify he understood her well.

“Like a bag of pea,” she nodded and he was about to interrogate her further, but Haylen and Danse returned from the roof, so they directed their attention to them.

“Give it a try, sir,” Haylen proposed and Danse nodded. He left his power armor and settled at the ham radio which was connected to the antenna on the roof. Everyone listened intently as Danse took a deep breath and started to operate the radio, “This is Gladius to Scabbard. Gladius to Scabbard, do you copy?”

For a few seconds they heard only static, so he repeated his message. More static noise followed, but this time someone answered.

“This is Scabbard, identify yourself,” the other side demanded, the man’s voice creaking thought the interference.

“Paladin Danse, registration number Dies. Noctis. Four. Zero. Seven. Penna,” he identified himself using a strange descendant of the old phonetic alphabet which was widely used in radio communication. For some reason, the Brotherhood was using latin words instead of ‘Delta’ or ‘November’.

“Roger that,” he said and paused for a few seconds. Winter believed that the other side made note of their conversation, which caused delays.

“What’s your position?” the other side asked about i such a manner which made both Haylen and Rhys relax, telltale sign that this was standard Brotherhood radio traffic.

“Cambridge Police Station, grid reference A109,” he reported.

“Please repeat,” he replied instantly.

“Grid reference Arx. One. Zero. Nine,” he repeated slower. “Cambridge Police Station.”

“Uh huh,” he stammered, as he most likely written the information down. “Please wait,” he stammered and the best they could do was waiting impatiently. Winter presumed he was  looking for the location on a map. After a minute or so, he transmitted again.

“Confirm that you are transmitting from the Commonwealth,” he asked diffidently.

“Affirmative,” Danse replied curtly.

“Roger that. Anything urgent to report?” he asked again.

“We recorded a unique energy reading in the area, potentially caused by Serpens,” he reported what he already told to her on the way to ArcJet.

“Roger Serpens, need to report it to the Elder,” he acknowledged what he had heard. “Do you have equipment to transfer the data?”

Scribe Haylen nodded eagerly and went to retrieve a modulator and started to attach it to the terminal next to the radio. “Affirmative,” Danse responded.

Winter didn’t understand half of the communication, so she scanned Haylen’s and Rhys’ face. She understood the seriousness of the situation, not from the words spoken, instead the glances they flashed at each other and their uneasy expressions.

“Transfer the readings now, Scabbard over,” he requested and signed off, “Ad Victoriam,” leaving static noise behind. Danse let out a relieved sigh and stood up to let Haylen work. The recon team made contact to home, and she was happy that she was part of it.

Haylen turned off the radio and attached it to the terminal through the signal modulator. She brought it online in several minutes and tested the connection between the modulator and the radio. Once everything was set up, she radioed in and started to transmit the data to the Capital Wasteland. She explained it will last quite some time, because these were high quality recordings and she will send it redundantly to prevent any data loss.

“Might as well you can start telling your story, Initiate,” Rhys suggested and gestured in the direction of the same table they discussed plans several days earlier with Preston.

She glanced at Danse who nodded in agreement as he sat down. Winter checked her Pip-Boy, it was dinner time already.

“Prepare some rations, it will be a long story,” she warned and started to rake through her bag to find something to eat. She gathered a bottle of purified water, some radstag jerky, three mutfruits she picked in Graygarden today and a box of snack cakes. She looked up just in time to see Haylen grinning at the box of Fancy Lad’s, “help yourself to some,” she smiled and opened the box, revealing the sugarcoated colourful cookies inside.

“No, too sugary for me,” she chuckled, her eyes sparkling mischievously.

Winter offered it around, Rhys just shook his head, arms folded but Danse reached out to take two at a time. As he was munching on it heartily, Rhys remarked, “I can’t understand how can you eat that crap, Danse,” to which the Paladin just shrugged and picked up another two. Winter realized what elicited Haylen’s reaction earlier.

“You can have all,” she offered it to the Paladin, “I never really liked them, but they don’t really expire, so...”

“Thank you,” he said and grabbed the box voraciously and devoured another one.


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Winter tells her life story to the recon team.
> 
>  
> 
> **This is an old, unedited chapter. I'll gradually update and split the chapters as I get thought them.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is dialogue heavy.

Once all four of them settled down with food and drink around the table, Winter started, “All right, before I begin, I’d like to know what you think about me,” she looked around them.

Both men looked at her with narrow eyes, scrutinizing her silently so Winter shot a sideways look at Haylen who sat beside her when she heard her inhale. She started guardedly, “I know it sounds crazy, but it seems that you lived before the Great War.” The scribe flashed her eyes to the two men but neither reacted visibly to the tomfoolery.

“Hm,” Winter smiled bittersweetly to the correct assessment, “why do you think that?” She started to chew a piece of jerky.

“You keep using pre-war terms like ‘bug spray’ or Washington D.C.,” Danse commented casually and picked up another snack cake.

“You have an original pre-war document with your photo on it,” Rhys blurted out like he was unable to hold it back anymore. Winter nodded and placed her driving licence on the table for everyone to see.

Haylen carried on, “you said that you were a lawyer and you showed me yourself in the newspaper.” When both men looked at Haylen quizzically, she retrieved the Bugle and folded it to the eighth page. They compared the two picture to each other and then to her face for a few seconds, but at this point none of them seemed to be deny the fact anymore.

“So, what’s the decipherment, soldier?” Danse asked with raised brows, leaning back in his chair once more, radiating his commanding presence.

“She was hibernated, sir,” Rhys put the missing link into play and Haylen’s jaw dropped.

“And you only say it now?” Haylen snapped at him ferociously and he just blinked for a moment, unable to formulate a witty response.

“Don’t bite his head off, Haylen,” Danse reprehended him slightly, sufficiently hiding that he was caught off-guard by her outburst as well.

“She just mentioned it when you were up tinkering,” he defended himself finally, earning an eye-rolling from Haylen and repressed chuckle from Danse in reaction that. These two must have been bartering a few times before. At this point Winter knew that it is time to take over the story.

“What does the Brotherhood know about Vault-Tec?” she probed. She didn’t want to bore them with what they may already know. Most wastelanders never heard of the Vault or believed that those were paradise on earth.

“A pre-war private corporation which built more than hundred of the so-called Vaults,” Haylen shared her knowledge. “Some of these were actual fallout shelters, just as they publicly advertised, but evidence suggests that most of them were built to conduct unethical experiments on human beings,” Haylen summarized what Winter also suspected after her run-ins with the corporation all around Boston.

“Just thinking about it makes me sick,” Danse growled angrily, eyes flaming for a moment.

“The few habitable Vaults were supposed to be the control group and some of them worked remarkably well. Sometimes a vault dweller appears here or there, hailing from one of these ‘normal’ vaults,” she finished spouting the history and looking at her with raised brows.

“Well, mine was definitely  _not_  control,” Winter snorted. “The vault consisted of a small group of scientists, some guards, their accommodations and almost a hundred cryo pods. They told us that they were for decontamination,” she snorted.  _There was so cold down there, how come she didn’t understand it then?_

“I suppose you were unaware of your situation until it was late,” Danse guessed gravely.

“Yes. I spent two hundred and ten years in the Vault but only seemed like an hour to me. Worst hour of my life,” she said and as she thought about it again, she lost control. The pain found its way up from her heart to her eyes, materializing in tears. Most days she could hold herself together, but today it was too much. First she found the photos, then she had to retell the worst day of her life. She sat there, sobbing, thinking about the coaly eyes of Nate.

“Hey,” she heard Haylen’s voice from her side, she moved closer and stroked her back, consoling her for her loss. “Here,” she handed her a tissue. Winter wiped her eyes then blew her nose. She wearily sighed a few times and got herself together.

“Must have been hell for you to learn the world you knew was gone,” Rhys said and it was the first time she didn’t detect any hostility in him. Instead he seemed genuinely sorry for her.

“It was,” she agreed with rasping breath and cleared her throat to get rid of the lump. “The first few days were the worst. I was alone, isolated. I thought everyone died, everywhere. I wanted to die too, to be with my husband again, but I wasn’t brave enough to do it, and hunger always made me to eat at least a few crumbles,” she recalled the most pathetic period of her existence. “Turned out that my old Mr. Handy survived too and he kept me from turning insane. He convinced me to go to Concord, where I met Preston and few other settlers. Best purchase of my in-laws, I say,” she finished with a snarky remark.

“No one else survived from the Vault?” Danse asked with furrowed brows, “you said there were a hundred other cryo pods.” No wonder he was the leader, he had great insight, cared for every detail.

“They died when the Institute came. Every single one of them. The Institute chose to suspend their life support to keep me alive as a  _backup_ , after they killed my husband in front of my eyes and took my son with them. Everyone else slowly suffocated in their pods when they left and froze me back. At least I did not had to witness their agony, because they instantly put me back to stasis,” she commented melancholically.

“Damn eggheads,” Rhys burst out. “No wonder the Elder despises them so much.”

“I’m not a big fan of them either, Knight,” she puffed. “That’s why I asked for your help, sir,” she looked at the Paladin pleading.

“Why are you so sure that the Institute was involved?” Danse tried to advance the topic and get answers out of her in the process but she was not quite ready to talk about Kellogg yet.

“At first I wasn’t. I’ll get to that part soon, but there is a logical order of the events, sir,” she deferred to answer and he beckoned, silently accepting her explanation.

“How did you get out then?” Haylen asked, trying to get to the point.

“Someone must have opened my cryopod remotely, because there was noone around, safe for some enormous cockroaches. I fell to the floor and the vault computer told me to vacate immediately. There were skeletons everywhere and a terrible stench. I learned from terminal entries that there was a mutiny when the employees discovered that Vault-Tec didn’t value their life a tad more than that of the test subjects. The only way out of the Vault required a Pip-Boy to operate,” she lightly shook her wrist, “but the only scientist who had one closed himself off with the Overseer. Pretty much everyone starved to death or killed each other,” she recounted the events.

“Another failed experiment of Vault-Tec,” Danse remarked bitterly. “All that brainpower put to waste...”

“What did you do after you left the Vault?” It was Rhys who was eager to hear more now. He might he a stick up in his rear, but there was a bit of curiosity in him too.

“I went back to my old house. The vault was just up the hill, I saw my neighborhood from the entrance. At first I didn’t knew what to do. I presumed my son was either dead or beyond reach. I spent days doing nothing. After Preston and the others moved in, the place started to feel ‘normal’ again. Depends on how do you  _define_ normal,” she exhaled through her nose and took a sip of her water.

“I can’t even imagine what you feel,” Danse remarked with sympathy and she smiled bitterly.

“I spent two months just tending chores in Sanctuary, trying to make the settlement self-sustaining. With the help of the settlers, we cleaned up the place, gathered resources and so on.” She picked up one of the mutfruits started to tear it apart. “Soon there were a dozen people around. I plowed mud to grow gourds. I helped to build shelter for every newcomer. I searched for usable scrap around the area and almost picked it clean. I did everything I could to occupy myself, to keep myself from thinking about the past,” she winced. “But when there weren't enough things to do, I drank. Almost every night. Some alcohol aged well, especially whiskey,” she mused, avoiding eye contact with anyone, because this wasn’t something she was proud of.

“Yet here you are, drinking but water,” Haylen gestured towards her drink without judging, reassuring her that it was in the past, not affecting her anymore.

“What changed?” Rhys asked with interest, gathering that much.

“It happened on Christmas Eve. You see, there's an elderly woman in Sanctuary. She has a… chem problem. She asked me to fetch her some chems to fuel her Sight,” she said.

“Sight?” Danse asked with healthy skepticism.

“She claimed to see the future. I didn’t really believe her, but it was Christmas Eve, so I figured if I am allowed drink, then she can get high, if she wants,” she shrugged and saw reprehension all around her. Before the War she was against taking drugs, she was modest with even the simple painkillers, but she was not about to force her opinion to anyone. She came to accept that the decision was not always up to her.

“Facilitating someone’s drug addiction is nefarious, soldier,” Danse reprehended her flatly.

“Yeah, but that’s not the point now,” she retorted without thinking, earning a fractious glare from him. “I was a lawyer, not a judge,” she said, but her words dissipated in the air like a faint winter breath. “So I gave her some Jet what she asked for earlier, and as she raved, she had the Sight,” she said and ate a piece of mutfruit.

“Bah, nonsense,” Rhys huffed and opened his rations.

“I didn’t give to much to her word either,” she assured him with an earnest nod. “But she told me that I’ll find answers in Diamond City and to look for a heart, shining bright in a dark alley. It was incoherent, but it planted the bug in my ear. A few days later she asked for Mentats, and I happened to have some...”

“I’m truly disappointed, soldier,” Danse continued to give her the cold shoulder, slowly shaking his head. She looked in his eyes, and she wished she hadn’t, because she saw loathing mixed with dismal in them. If she was about to follow his orders, it would be nice for him not to berate her for actions she couldn’t change.

“Mentats is a psychoactive substance,” Haylen added, snapping her out of her musing. “How much did she take?”

“Four of five pills, I didn’t pay attention,” she answered honestly.

“No wonder she saw things,” Haylen rolled her eyes and reached for a piece of mutfruit timidly, so Winter put a handful in front of her. She must have had enough ration for life.

“Maybe, but what she told me, proved to be true. Preston and I went to Diamond City, and I learned that there was a detective agency in town. The store sign was a red neon heart,” she recalled, absently tracing a heart shape in the air with two fingers.

“Just like in the vision,” Danse added and picked up another cookie.

“Don’t tell me you believe it, sir,” Rhys said with wide eyes.

“She wouldn’t tell us, if it weren’t important somehow,” he disagreed with a puzzled face.

“It was run by Nick Valentine. Heard about him?” she asked them.

“I don’t think so,” Danse speculated.

Winter closed the newspaper, to show them the article on the cover. It featured a photo of a smooth faced criminal and a catchy headline.

“He was working in ‘Operation Winter’s End’ before the War,” she tapped on the words in the article and seeing the confusion in Rhys’ eyes, she added, “no, Eddie’s not related to me. It’s just a coincidence I didn’t realize until it was too late.” None of them seemed to understood why she was talking about a pre-war mobster all of a sudden.

“Cambridge Police Station was the base of ‘Operation Winter’s End’ and my husband worked here as a police officer at the same time. I even met this Valentine once, fleetingly. Right there,” she pointed to the office area. “So I was pretty surprised to hear his name again.”

“Did he became a ghoul?” Rhys guessed with disgust.

“That’s what I thought first,” she mused and it brought up a memory.

 

Winter was entertained by the whole situation. The old-school, tommy gun wielding mobsters dressed in suits made her feel like she was in some old detective story. But unlike the hero of the those stories, she was equipped with more firepower than a simple revolver. When she finally reached the detective’s lockup, she almost forgot why she was there.

“Gotta love the irony of the reverse damsel-in-distress scenario,” the man in a trenchcoat lept out of the shadow. “Question is, why did our heroine risk life and limb for an old private eye?”

The reality of the situation oozed back to her mind. She stared at him with wide eyes, looking at his odd features. He had shining yellow eyes, but he wasn’t feral. Wasn’t ghoul at all. Her eyes wandered to his exposed, metallic jaw and to the robotic arm with which he held a cigarette, “What happened to you, Mr. Valentine?”

She was unable to read his expression, but his voice seemed a little surprised.

“Nothing yet, but we got three minutes before they realize muscles-for-brains ain't coming back,” he urged her and picked the weapon from the body of the mobster she sniped a minute ago.

“Last time I saw you… you were less machine,” she wondered, trying to recall the image of the detective she met in Cambridge. “But you don’t remember, I guess.”

“Last time?” he stopped and looked at her, scanning her face with his circular sensors. “Hold up a second, you  _do_  look familiar,” he stared, scrutinizing her features, and Winter pushed her goggles to her forehead, to reveal her eyes. Those are the mirror of the soul, they say. “You didn’t happen to have black hair back in the days, now did ya?” he narrowed his eyes, like he was in disbelief. She couldn’t tell because she haven’t saw any earlier model synths this close yet. Not one which wanted to talk, that is.

“Just before the bombs,” she bantered in good humor and he slightly nodded.

“Theresa was it, right?” he asked wonderingly and she nodded with a little smile. “You managed to catch the airing that night?” Whatever happened to the pre-war Nick Valentine, this synth somehow had his memories.

“We did,” she grinned and put the goggles back to place. “The movie wasn’t that great though.”

“Apart from the gray hair, you didn’t age a bit, Mrs. Irwin,” Nick added, conjuring her name and raising his fedora to greet her.

“Vault-Tec’s full of fun little surprises,” she snickered. “Speaking of which… let’s get out of this goddamn vault already.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have you ever wondered how did the Brotherhood learned that the SoSu is pre-war? I did.  
> I mean, there is no dialogue with either Haylen or Danse or Rhys, but when you talk with Cade, he mentions he had just missed the memo? You had to tell it somehow.  
> Also, I thought that stalling the story before Reunions (arriving of the Prydwen AKA second act) is lame, so I played around a little with the quest order.


	12. Chapter 12

She smiled as she thought about her friend. When she wasn’t travelling with Preston, she usually had Nick by her side. Turned out that he had his own personality, but it was built largely on that of the detective.

“How come this  _abomination_  possesses the memories of a pre-war detective?” Danse asked in an irritated tone.

She plowed through her bag and found the holotape she was looking for, “this explains that ‘Operation Winter’s End’ was just cover, but what’s more important is the end of it,” she said and placed it in her Pip-Boy. She forwarded it to skip the irrelevant parts.

“Why are you keeping all these holotapes with you?” Rhys asked, the thing obviously bothering him.

“I have an ongoing investigation and I might need some information from them,” she explained and reviewed her collection for a while. Only two were missing before they could confront the man behind it. Or ghoul, but she considered the non ferals just as much people.

_“...file room. Nick, listen to me. Everything that's happened. With Winter. With... Jenny. It's more than any one man should have to handle. You need help. Boston PD has been working with the eggheads at C.I.T. Some new program they have to deal with trauma. Scanning brainwaves or some such. I'll get you the info. You're going. That's an order.”_

Winter looked around and saw confusion on their faces, in Haylen’s case mixed with some kind of understanding.

“What is this C.I.T.?” Rhys asked.

“The old University on the other side of Cambridge,” Haylen answered. “The Commonwealth  _Institute_ of Technology?” she asked mockingly, eyes darted at Rhys, but he had none of it.

“I take the  _synth_  doesn’t remember how to get back to the Institute?” Danse supposed with poorly hid ire.

“No, he was a discarded experiment,” Winter shook her head. “The  _original_  Valentine was ruined by the loss of his fiancé and the whole messed up situation. He most likely died in the War. The Institute dusted off his memories more than a century later and experimented a little. It didn’t go well, so they discarded the project and he ended up in a garbage heap,” she recalled what Nick told her.

“Where it belongs,” Danse muttered under his nose. Winter took a mental note not to bring Nick to the Police Station in the near future.  _If only this hatred weren’t blind._

“That’s sad, but what does this have to do with your missing son?” Haylen picked up the previous thread and Winter was grateful that neither of the men adhered to the topic.

“On our way out, we were stopped by the mobster boss and her girlfriend. I remembered Mama Murphy’s vision, she predicted it accurately. I couldn’t believe, but when I repeated her words, they let us go freely,” Winter snorted as she recalled because it still felt unbelievable. “When I told Nick the details, he immediately recognized and identified the killer. He said that a mercenary named Kellogg settled in Diamond City with a ten year old boy not long ago, but disappeared a few weeks before I arrived.”

“How old was your son exactly?” Rhys asked reflectively, evidencing that he used his brain sometimes. “When he was kidnapped,” he elaborated needlessly.

“Three months,” she said and dug out a photo of him.

“Cute,” Haylen smiled and picked up the photo. “Got his father’s eyes?”

“Yes, look,” she handed her the photo with Nate and Roger, were they were all smiling.

“Who’s the other man?” Haylen deterred from the topic, frowning.

“An old family friend, and our best man,” she shuddered at the thought that it easily could have been reversed. “He was in the army, I don’t know what happened to him.”

“Looks familiar,” Haylen mused with clenched eyebrows. Rhys leaned over to see, but just shrugged after a few seconds. Roger was only a captain, he didn’t do anything historically significant.

Danse didn’t care to see the photos, he was more interested to advance the story instead, “You think that the boy with Kellogg was your son?”

“He was said to have black hair too,” she pointed at their photo, both of them having black scalps. “All later evidence suggest that it was him. So we tracked Kellogg, to his base of operation; Fort Hagen.” The determination that she might find Shaun in there brought her forward. Now, looking back it seemed a suicide mission to go there, but she survived and he did not. All three of them sported serious expressions after she mentioned the military base.

“Don’t tell me that it was you who purged all those synths lying around there?” Rhys burst out incredulously, eyes wide.

“Uhm, yeah, I was determined to face that psychopath and the Gen-1s were in my way,” she shrugged.

“My team reconnoitered the fort a few months ago, but it was already picked clean,” the Paladin explained. “Is it true, that was your handiwork?”

“ _Ours_ , Nick was with me,” she nodded. “I don’t say it was easy, though.”

“Explains the lack of blood and the small amount of spent ammunition casings, sir,” Haylen grinned at Danse whose face was covered in awe.

“Outstanding, I will include this in your file, soldier,” he remarked with an amused tone and even Rhys managed hum in recognition.

“Um, thank you, sir,” she blushed.

“Which one of you were in power armor?” he surprised him with his question, and she bowed to his perceptive skill inwardly.

“How did you know that?” she asked agaze, not remembering to mention wearing one.

“I recognize a fusion core depleted by power armor when I see one,” he tilted his head knowingly, with a bit of professional pride.

“Me,” she nodded with a smug smile, “I have a complete T-45 suit in Sanctuary, but it’s hard to use,” she confessed, eliciting an appreciative glance from him. “You make it look like it’s easy.” Contrary her best effort, she had a hard time using power armor effectively and always felt like a bull in a china shop in one.

“I received power armor training in the Citadel,” he told her good-naturedly. “How could a civilian even operate it?” he asked with genuine curiosity.

“With difficulties, sir,” she cracked up remembering her first few inelegant tries. “Nate told me the essentials and I picked up the rest,” she said pandering and tapped at the photo when she savvied she haven’t mentioned him by the name yet.

“I thought he was a policeman,” Danse mused quizzically, only flashing his eyes at the photo for a fragment second. “Law enforcement forces were not equipped with it.”

“He left the army to look after his parents in Malden,” she explained pointing absently in the direction they lived. “He was an anchorage veteran, but resigned after he was reassigned to supervise a research facility.”

“He served together with this man?” Haylen asked surfacing from her thoughts.

“Yeah,” she smiled, “actually it was Roger who presented us to each other,” she said and Haylen’s eyes narrowed a little as she contemplated something. Whatever came into her mind, she was hesitant to say it, so Winter returned to the previous topic. “So, Kellogg told me that my son was not there with him in Fort Hagen, he works for the Institute and my son is in there, and calls it home. Calls the Institute his home!  _That_ was the part where I lost control and blasted his damn head off,” she growled, powerless.

“While I understand you were furious, but… was it necessarily needed to launch a nuclear warhead at him in close quarters?” Danse asked with raised brows. They really must have been there, if he knew this detail.

“Maybe not, but it felt good nonetheless,” she smirked and saw some disgust skim through the Paladin’s face. “And it helped to find an implant on his remains. It was embedded in his brain, some kind of technology. I would miss that if his skull remained intact,” she grimaced.

“Why was it so important that he had that implant?” Rhys asked about, set back by the memory of the mercenaries splattered remains.

“Ever heard of the Memory Den? It’s down in Goodneighbor,” she asked and Rhys scowled in response, believing she evaded answering him.

“No. There’s nothing of interest there,” Danse shook his head with a hint of disdain in his lines.

She wasn’t sure it was elicited by the place or what she said earlier, so she opted for the former, “I see. So, this Memory Den is a place where people can relive old memories in exchange for a good sum of caps. It can be addictive to some, but I hope I don’t have to sit in a lounger ever again. Nick suggested to look for some Dr. Amari there,” she said and before she became aware Curie approached them.

“This is the doctor we are about to see, yes?” she asked and Winter nodded. “I’m curious to hear about her.”

“Why would a robot need this doctor?” Rhys asked perplexed, analyzing the robot in amusement.

“Why is it that interesting a Miss Nanny would like to meet another doctor?” Winter asked back, hoping that the robot will take the hint not to answer, but she was wrong.

“I wish to become human, monsieur,” she chirped and Rhys inescapably cracked up. “The greatest scientific minds of history have had something beyond raw data analysis capabilities. This elusive inspiration is something I  _must_ possess,” Curie explicated heatedly, inflicting a smile on Haylen’s face.

“What you need is a thorough re-programming,” he snickered, patronizing the robot.

“I kindly refuse your offer,” Curie said but backed away a few feet cautiously. “He mustn’t be serious, yes?”

“Don’t worry Curie, I won’t allow that to happen,” she defended her and daggered Rhys with her gaze as much she dared to.

“Silly robot,” Rhys muttered under his nose, loud enough for everyone to hear it.

“She won’t be here much longer, please tolerate her until then,  _sir_ ,” she asked Rhys and he reluctantly nodded.

“Was this Amari helpful?” Haylen returned to the main thread.

“Oh yes. She linked up this augmenter thing with Nick’s brain and connected it to the lounger. I saw several of Kellogg's memories, defining who he was, why he worked for the Institute, but the most interesting was the last memory,” she told and closed her eyes as she conjured up the scene.

“Traveling within someone else's memories must have been quite an experience,” Danse remarked like a child who just saw an aeroplane the first time.

She drank a mouthful of her water before continuing. “I saw my son and Kellogg in his house in Diamond City. Shaun was reading science magazines, while Kellogg cleaned his revolver when a Courser arrived.” She grimaced at the thought that it was the same weapon he used to kill Nate. Her eyes searched for Nate’s photo and she lost herself in his gaze once again. Forever cheerful, forever happy. He doesn’t have to live in the wasteland...

“A Courser?” Haylen asked. “Isn’t that some kind of animal? A horse?”

“It’s an Institute synth, Haylen,” Danse shared his knowledge with her, when he saw that Winter was elsewhere. “A human looking one,” he added ominously.

“What happened then?” Rhys asked, snapping Winter back to the reality.

“The Courser issued new orders for Kellogg, sent him to eliminate a scientist who escaped and was hiding in the Glowing Sea,” she added shuddering at the thought of the ground zero.  _Why would anyone want to hide just there?_

“How long ago was all this?” Danse asked, frowning.

“I saw the memories two months ago,” she said, looking up her notes in her Pip-Boy. “Plus the few weeks before I arrived, so three months or more.”

“Without proper equipment no one can survive there that long. The radiation in that area is lethal,” Danse remarked unnecessarily. “He either protected himself somehow or is dead by now.”

“I hope it’s the first option, he came from the greatest scientific facility of our time,” she voiced her hopes. “I have a hazmat suit, so it could bear with the radiation but… I’m a little afraid of the local fauna,” she explained glumly. “The Courser took Shaun back to the Institute. He asked him to stand beside him and ‘ _relayed in_ ’ with him. They disappeared to thin air with a zap. Dr. Amari suggested it was—”

“—Teleportation!” Haylen exclaimed all of a sudden. “This explains the energy readings in the area, sir!”

Danse contemplated what he had heard before speaking. “Scribe Haylen, when you finished transmitting the signal data, report these new informations to the Citadel. The Institute has access to teleportation but we might have a lead inside.”

“Yes, sir!” Haylen replied eagerly, but remained seated, knowing that the transmission was still far from over.

He looked at Winter and continued, “I appreciate that you told us all this, soldier.”

“It’s the least if I want help from the Brotherhood,” she admitted honestly. “Ever since I ventured into that psychopath’s memories I’m trying to find another way into the Institute, because I’m afraid to go into that irradiated hell, to find a man who might be good as dead by the radiation already.” All four of them nodded in silent agreement.

“But what if he’s still alive?” Haylen voiced her deepest fear, a reason which bothered Winter since she came aware of the existence of this rogue scientist. If he somehow survived, and she bet he did, he might had invaluable information. So close, yet tantalizingly far.

“It can only be found out one way,” she noted darkly, “if I pay this  _Dr. Brian Virgil_  a visit.”

“That’s a suicide mission,” Rhys remarked with furrowed brows.

“Not necessarily, if she uses her power armor,” Danse propounded.

“Or if you come with me, sir,” she riposted challengingly without thinking twice.

“He can’t,” Rhys rebuked her but some defiant spark in Danse’s eyes let out he thought otherwise. 


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **This is an old, unedited chapter. I'll gradually update and split the chapters as I get thought them. Only edit I made was omitting a scene I need to rework.**

Winter sighed when she left the Memory Den and Curie behind her. As much as she loved the robot, sometimes she could be too much. Today was such a day. 

Doctor Amari was not entirely convinced when Winter presented her Curie and the idea to transfer her consciousness to a human body, but wasn’t outright rejecting to help either. She pondered their options and proposed to use a synth body instead. After briefly initiating Curie about Amari’s role in the Railroad’s efforts, the robot repelled with so much joy that Winter feared she’d fry her circuits. Amari asked for a day to contact the caretaker of a brain dead synth, who might be the perfect candidate for the transfer, so Winter elected to spend the night in Goodneighbor. Curie and Amari were discussing about brain functions and the human neural system, and Winter figured a drink from Charlie wouldn’t hurt, so she excused herself and promised to come back in the morning. 

It was already dark outside. Apparently, listening to the conversation between these medical minds took more time than she realized. She glanced up at the clear sky as she crossed ‘Court Street’ and started down to the Old State House, which was few blocks to the east. The Scollay Square was a disreputable area of Boston before the War, with its locales and high crime rate and it certainly wasn’t a place she would willingly spend the night alone. Now, two centuries later in this upended world, it was quite the opposite. Even though the place kept its characteristic traits, like the red lights and was teeming with drugs, the town of Goodneighbor, surrounded by tall walls and nestled in the ruins of old Boston was considered a safe place in the Wasteland. 

Once, during her studies, she came across an article in an old newspaper (which ceased to exist decades before the War), detailing the construction plans of Boston to rehabilitate the area by erasing Scollay Square from the map, replacing it with grandiose public offices. The plan met public anger and the demolition was postponed end eventually rejected. That is how in the middle of a bustling metropolis, a three-century old party district remained more or less intact, with all its alleyways and shady businesses. Sometimes later the district lost from its old fame, a few houses were replaced by skyscrapers, a highway was erected over it, but the milieu remained. Much to her amusement, this was still true; visiting Goodneighbor was tantamount to time travel, back to Capone’s age, when trench coats and suspenders were the unofficial dress code. 

That’s why she had a double-take when she passed a particularly dark alleyway with a trench coated, fedora wearing figure inside. Would his eyes not shining yellow, she hadn’t recognize her friend. Winter looked around before stepping into the alleyway, blending to the shadows and approached him.

“Nick,” she greeted him, high in spirits, but low in voice. 

“If it isn’t my favourite frozen banana,” he tipped his fedora in response, shooting her a quick but friendly look, resuming his glare on the deserted back alley. 

“What are you doing in the lowest place in the Commonwealth?” she asked, crouching next to him behind a dumpster, fixing her eyes at the street as well. 

“Wrapping up a case. Help me, will ya?” 

“Sure thing, partner,” she agreed with a grin and readied her pistol. “What’s the plan?” Winter always loved detective stories, so  _ being  _ one was like a childhood dream came true and a nice change of pace after the wasteland.  _ Like time travel, really. _

“Take the next alley, it joins back to this one. Unless the man can fly, we got him.”

 

“What exactly are you doing in there?” Nate asked from the other side of the door. Theresa hasn’t left the utility room for an hour; he must’ve started to worry. 

“A minute and you’ll see!” she replied enigmatically, giggling to herself. 

“Oh-kay,” he replied, not too enthusiastically.

She spared a last glance on her freshly finished Halloween costume before she hastily put the materials and DIY tools back to their place. She donned a pair of black slacks and a black trenchcoat, wrapped a silver scarf around her neck and put on the black fedora, lined with silver ribbon she was lucky to acquire this afternoon. 

“Nate?” she called out, not knowing if he was gone as she got the gloves on.

“Keep it down, Shaun is sleeping,” he heard him murmuring close. 

“Turn off the overhead lamps, please,” she asked and grabbed a plastic tommy gun what she painted to silver with acrylics and flipped the light-switch inside.

“Already done,” he said and with that she opened the sliding door. 

For a few seconds, he was staring into the darkness before his eyes found her contour, but the minimal amount of light coming from the kitchen made his reaction possible to see; first his eyes grew wide, then he frowned appreciatively and hummed. A proud smirk started to curve her lips but she steeled herself and kept a straight face.

“Death has come for you, evil doer, and I am its Shroud!” she said with an orotund voice, mimicking the character, earning a heartfelt chuckle from her husband.

“Oh no, don’t hurt me, Shroud!” he exclaimed theatrically, stepping back a pace in played protest. “My wife vanished in this cursed cabinet more than an hour ago! Didn’t you see her? I’m worried about her,” he pleaded with clasped hands, shine in his eyes alike that of a kid on Christmas day. He enjoyed this just as much she did.

“Indeed I saw her,” she said and with that took off her fedora and bowed before him. “Here she is!”

“I didn’t know the Shroud was a woman,” he said cheekily, hugging her and pressing a kiss on her lips.

“Creative freedom,” she responded jauntily. “Shaun can go trick or treating with the Shroud watching his back. No one will withhold his rightful sweets,” she joked in character again.

“He doesn’t even has teeth yet,” Nate objected soberly.

“More for us, then,” she smirked mischievously and Nate rolled his eyes.

“Will you ever grow up?” he asked merrily.

“That not on the list of my short-term plans.”

 

_ A mercenary, an android and a woman out of time walks into a bar. _

What may sound like the beginning of a mediocre pre-war joke was the pitiless reality of Winter’s life. She wondered how much more degrees of absurd her life can achieve,  because the wasteland was full of surprises. 

Witnessing total nuclear annihilation was just the beginning of her grotesque story. So far she encountered cannibalistic raiders, synthetic people, giant insects, two headed stags or lunatics worshipping radiation, to name a few. A pool cue or a baseball bat were more than recreational tools, while a bundle of dollars was not more than a roll of toilet paper. A can of pure water worth more than a mattress for a night. Yet still, even with so much customs forgotten, there were some things that never changed; people liked to have a drink after work and discuss their problems.

Winter thought the  _ Third Rail _ under the Old State House was the best place to hang out around here. One could get their booze from nearly every vendor in town, as every second building was a speakeasy, pub or grog shop, and most of them doubled as drug dens too, but unlike others, the  _ Rail _ had live music and the coolest setting of all; nothing beat drinking your pain away in an old school metro station, even if it costed more.

The detectives met the hired gun a minute before entering the pub. MacCready just arrived back from a job and invited her to a drink, what Winter tried to refuse, but he insisted for her help resolving his Gunner problem. Nick and Winter settled around a coffee table in a corner, while Mac ordered up. He soon appeared with a cold beer and a Nuka-Scotch in hands. 

“Damn, I forgot to pick up that motor oil for you, Valentine,” he said as he put the booze down and threw himself into the third armchair. Winter rolled her eyes, it was such a banal joke, even from him.

“Cute, MacCready,” he replied with a wry smile. “You come up with that all on your own?”

As the two japed it was so easy to forget the harsh reality of the Wasteland over the walls. The super mutants roaming the street for a human snack, the feral ghouls creeping out of tight cavities, gurgling and swarming or the raiders of Haymarket who used anything that moved as target practice.

Winter took a sip of her drink; it was quite strong, was it a double? She frowned, “It’s a shame it ended like this, Nick.”

“There was not much we could do anyway,” he stated, staring to a non defined point melancholically.

“Care to share?” MacCready inquired like a kid. To think, with his twenty-three years he was little more than a toddler compared to them. Winter was uncertain how old really Nick was, and he didn’t remember either. As a prototype synth, he was definitely older than the Gen-3s, which were around for almost sixty years, according to the Broken Mask Incident. The degradation of his features suggested that he spent that much time on the surface already. What’s more important, his personality was pre-war, just like she herself. To think, she was close to her quarter-millennia! But all joking aside, without counting her two-hundred-ten years on ice, she was still older than Mac, and not just biologically. 

“A case which ended badly, Mac,” she sighed and sipped from her drink.

“A pair of lovebirds from Diamond City were murdered,” Nick took the story over, “ _ Juliet  _ was a synth, but when  _ Romeo  _ found it out, he didn’t freak out. They contacted the Railroad and moved to a settlement together. Little later turned out that the lad was a synth too.”

“Oh man, that’s fu--,” MacCready caught himself mid-curse and corrected himself, “that’s mean.” He told Winter that he wanted to quit cursing, but emotional statements still brought it out.

“And it just gets worse,” Winter remarked, followed by a nose-exhale.

“Word got back to  _ Juliet’s father _ and  _ Romeo’s mother _ . The parents vow revenge together on the Institute and came up with a plan. They murdered each other’s kid and covered each other’s tracks.”

“So what? Better some synths than us,” Mac remarked absently. Winter was annoyed by the young man’s nonchalance but she didn’t show it.

“Don’t mind me, MacCready...” Nick said dryly, somewhat insulted, and continued before Mac had a chance to account for it, “Problem is,  _ Romeo _ wasn’t a synth really. When his mother learned the truth, she lost it. Witnesses said  _ Mrs. Montague _ shouted with her partner-in-sin. Later she was found dead and the good  _ Mr. Capulet _ vanished. I tracked him to Goodneighbor and we faced him not more than an hour ago. He confessed the murders, all three but said the last one was self-defense. Didn’t wanna come with us and ate his pistol instead,” Nick finished gravely and shook his head.

“Another four people dead because of the Institute,” MacCready remarked and took a gulp of his beer.

“Five. Don’t forget the synth replacement of  _ Juliet _ ,” she said flatly and drank half of her drink. “Damn the Institute! They decide to snatch someone, for God knows why, potentially killing both the original person and the replacement when people find out. And they found out often. People are not idiots. Not to mention the collateral damage, like this case, when people shoot each other out of paranoia and hatred. And you know what makes me sick? I was the heavy who helped them reach the safehouse.” She took mental note to update Desdemona and Glory on the case. 

All three of them held their peace for a minute.

 

“Speaking of the boogeyman, any luck tracking your son?” Nick asked suddenly and she let out an explosive breath.  _ Here we are again. _ No matter the topic, their conversations  _ always _ had to hook back to the same subject; the Institute and Shaun.

“No,” she admitted defeatedly. “I’m stuck. I’m- I’m not ready to leap through the gates of hell yet, but I can’t find any other clues and I’m running out of ideas. Damn this Dr. Virgil, why did he have to hide in the Glowing Sea?” she asked rhetorically, recalling the image of the mushroom cloud which made the skyscrapers of Boston city look like mock-ups.

“Can’t say I blame you,” Mac commented sympathetically.

Valentine tried to shook her up. “Hey, if ya need a partner, I’m here for ya. Radiation isn’t much of an issue for me,” he offered.

“Careful, I might take you at your word one day,” she replied gratefully, more to calm him than actually planning to go there. At least not anytime soon.

“I mean it, kiddo,” he assured her needlessly. If she had to choose one person and only one person to entrust her life with, it would be him.

“I know Nick and thank you,” she said and squeezed his plastic hand, unsure if he felt it as a human would. A slight dim of his golden irises told him that he most likely did. “I just… I don’t want to accept that the only answer I can find is in the God damned Glowing Sea! That’s the ground zero, where the end of the world begun,” she finished, sinking back to her chair, suddenly all-too-aware of everything she lost.


	14. Chapter 14

“I can’t believe I sit here with two pre-war relics,” MacCready said and his comment stirred up memories of her recent acquisition, knocking her off of her self-pity.

“Speaking of relics, look what I found!” she exclaimed, producing the folder from her haversack. She divided the a pictures between her friends, commenting on the topmost one, “It’s Shaun and Nate.”

“Yeah, I remember Officer Irwin,” Nick said pensively, glancing at the picture over the table. “Saw him couple of times, but we  _ -they-  _ haven’t talked much. Different departments and such,” Nick said and his focus shifted as he recalled the past. “Strange, that I remember everything that the real Nick saw, but I can’t remember my own past; how did I end up at that garbage heap,” he trailed off, and Winter reassuringly squeezed his upper arm. Nick closed his eyes for a moment to sort something out.

“Wait a minute!” MacCready exclaimed, taking one of the pictures under close inspection, “is that you?” He involuntarily whistled appreciatively, earning a punch to his shoulder from her. “Ow! That was compliment, relax!”

“I’d like to see how you look after two hundred years on ice!” she snapped at him with played resentment. She wasn’t mad really, but sometimes it felt good to annoy Mac, just for the sake of it. He deserved one for his earlier comment about the murdered synth, so she attacked, “are you implying that I look  _ ugly _ now?” and mimicked a hurtful face.

MacCready made the mistake of drinking from his beer while she spoke so he ended up coughing when he saw her expression and the gulp went down his trachea. She helped him by some well-directed hit on his back; accidentally killing him was not what she wanted.

“That’s not what I meant,” he defended himself, stammering, “It’s- it's just… you’ve changed a lot. Like if it were two different women.”

“He has a point,” Nick added tellingly, speaking of first-hand experience, even if it was merely a brief encounter before the War. 

Winter figured that’s enough of the torture already, “Relax, Mac, I was just joking. Sorry,” she added, putting her hand on his shoulder as a token of gratitude. He replied to it with a quick little smile. “You’re quite right by the way. I was different back then; weak, soft, careeristic and naive. Now I’m tougher, harder, a need-to-be survivor. I think my new looks fits the Wasteland better. And without ointments, mascara and hair dye, I will never look like that again,” she finished, musing, scrutinizing her old portrait.

“I don’t know, you look natural here,” he frowned confused.

Winter laughed. “Oh, Mac, never grow up! And thank you, the stylist was quite expensive, but did his job right.”

“You say there were men dolling up women?” MacCready asked unbelieving. “The old world was nuttier than I thought so.” 

“I can assure you, it was,” she agreed, sparing him the details of this particular stylist. She just hoped the man died a peaceful death and wasn’t roaming around in his baby blue suits as a feral ghoul. He certainly wouldn’t wanted to end up like that after all the time he spent on himself.

“Who’s this?” Mac pointed at their best man with interest, making her forget the buffoon. 

“The one who introduced us to each other, his name was Roger.” Funny, how much she had to recall about Roger in the past few days. Their relationship was impetuous and she tried not to think about ‘what would have been if’.

“No offense, but why did you choose Mr. Ponytail? That Roger looks more like your type,” MacCready asked wonderingly, not knowing how close he guessed by sheer luck.

She was grateful for knowing him and that he introduced her to her then-husband, but now she understood that they weren’t meant for each other. Roger was like fire and she was like ice; both with the chance to blemish and ruin the other one. Letting each other go was the hardest decision of their life. Now, as she studied his face once again, she had a feeling that he survived the bombing safe and sound. She just knew it. If anyone was fit for the wasteland, it was him.

“Because Nate asked me out, not Roger. Also, he was married and had a son when we met,” she told him, trying to remain as vague as possible. “And if you want to know, Nate was quite self-conscious of his hair,” she finished, smiling and Mac rolled his eyes.

If she was ice and Roger was fire, then Nate was water. Water and ice were different aspects of the same thing. Water accepts, adorns, embraces ice and merges with it when it melts. She felt weightless in her marriage just like ice floating on the surface of water. After vowing fidelity she wouldn’t and couldn’t imagine his life without him. But she had to and it was hard.

 

*

 

“These photos are remarkably well preserved,” Nick interpolated quietly, “where did you find them? Not in Sanctuary, I take,” he asked about, genuine curiosity ringing in his voice; the detective never slept.

“It was in the Police Station all the time. Nate’s old desk was preserved and locked tight under a pile of debris,” she explained.

“Poor Preston, did you make him dig it up?” Mac asked jokingly.

“Huh? No. Garvey wasn’t even with me,” she replied scowling.

“Oh? I thought Mr. Puppy Eyes would never leave your side. And since when you two aren’t on first name basis?” Mac asked with narrowed eyes.

“No, he would not, that is sure,” she agreed nodding slowly, “but he is supervising the work in the Castle.” It only was only two days ago, but it already felt like an eternity.  _ It had to be done. _

“What’s the Castle?” Mac asked with furrowed brows.

“An old motte on the ocean shore,” Nick offered his knowledge. There probably wasn't anyone who know the Commonwealth better than him. “Used to be the Minuteman HQ, until some sea monster drove them away forty years or so ago.”

“A mirelurk queen decided to start her family there,” she explained. “The whole fort was teeming with her offsprings.”

“Why bother retaking an old fort which reeks of crab and fish?” Mac asked back, uncomprehending.

“You remember the Starlight incident, right?” she asked, brows knitted.

“It’s hard to forget, never saw that many synths at once before.”

“It still gives me the shivers,” she agreed shuddering. “We had to do something. The Castle has a beefy radio tower, big enough to reach any settlements in the Commonwealth. Preston convinced me it will worth the effort, so we gathered all the Minutemen and managed to clear the crabs out. I wonder if they were able to start broadcasting already,” she mused and tuned her Pip-Boy to ‘Radio Freedom’. She expected static, but was welcomed by violin music and the voice of Dallas, announcing that the night was quiet - just how they liked it. She wondered how much effect the new HQ will have on the Minuteman efforts, because God knows, she’d already hang her tricorn hat. Sure, the cause was noble, but it took almost all her strength to defend the settlements from attackers.

“Turn that shit down, I can’t hear ‘Nolia!” a drifter howled her down and she hastily turned the radio off. 

“Sounds like you were productive since we part ways,” MacCready said with an amused nod.

“Let’s see! Sanctuary now has a dazzling population of fourteen people, Preston and I cleared Concord of hostiles, again, made some new friends in Cambridge and found two more issues of  _ Guns and Bullets _ on the way to the Castle,” she listed in one breath.

“I’d borrow them if you don’t mind?” he asked eagerly, grin already wide on Winter’s face.

“Here,” she handed him one of the magazines, “When you finished, give it to any of my provisioners and it will eventually end up on my shelf.”

“You’ve done real good for the Commonwealth this time, you know that?” Nick asked amiably, proudly beaming at his friend.

“With Radio Freedom up and running we will be able to alert any nearby Minutemen when a settlement needs help. Hopefully there won’t be any more disasters hereafter. As if Quincy weren’t enough…,” she finished and downed the rest of her drink before sinking back to her chair.

“Gotta take a little more than hoping,” Nick commented gravelly. He was right, like always.

She scowled. “We need some help, but I think I just found out who could help.” She turned to the mercenary, who cocked an eyebrow in response. “Mac, you’re from DC, right? I mean, the Capital Wasteland.”

“Yes, but I don’t see why is that important?” He shot her a confused look.

“I want to ask you something.”

“If you want me to join the Minutemen, my answer is no. I’m a freelancer. Also, the Minutemen pay-rates are terrible,” he finished jokingly, to lift the mood and make-up for his up-front denial.

Winter knew that after his misunderstanding with the gunners, the mercenary was unlikely to join a faction anytime soon. “The philantropical jobs never paid well. There was even a term for it in my profession: ‘ _ pro bono _ ’. Sometimes to make name for yourself you had to work for free,” she added, interpreting the long lost idea. “Don’t worry, I just wanted to ask if you have heard about the Brotherhood of Steel.”

Mac’s face was a case study; as she spoke, he gradually relaxed, slightly raising his brows at the latin words, but the last three words made him tense up, he grimaced and his eyes grew large.

“ _ If _ I heard about them? They’re part of the reason I left, things got pretty hot with them running the show,” he said sullenly and raised his brows. “Why do you ask?”

Winter grimaced. It wasn’t exactly what she waited and certainly not a good start. “Since you’re the only one I know from the Capital Wasteland, I was curious what you can tell me about their motives and intentions, quirks and triggers. That kind of stuff.”

“Where did you met them?” he asked back, evading answering.

“Who said I met them?”

“Why else would you ask?”

“Good point,” she admitted to her defeat and smiled. “You know me all too well, Mac. I met a few soldiers in Cambridge, who claimed the Police Station for themselves,” she explained briefly.

“That explains how you were able to dig up Irwin’s desk,” Nick noted with sudden clarence.

“I suppose they are the  _ friends _ you mentioned?” MacCready asked, his tone giving away he didn’t consider them as such.

“I helped them out and their leader offered me membership, what I accepted and I want to know what does it mean exactly.” That she outright asked for the membership she neglected to mention after a start like this. 

“The Brotherhood of Steel offered membership because you helped them once?” Mac asked scowling, not really bothering to hide his irritation.

“Twice,” she clarified slightly offended. “First, Preston and I balanced a fight against a horde of feral ghouls, which were swarming from College Square. They were outnumbered and already lost a man when we arrived.”

“Well, the Harvard’s not the intellectual hotbed it used to be,” Nick commented melancholically.

“This is hardly enough to convince the buckos. What was the second?”

“I helped their Paladin retrieve some pre-war tech to allow them to reach their headquarters via radio. The site was teeming with first-gens, but Paladin Danse wasn’t fooling around.”

“No, they usually don’t,” Mac agreed bitterly. “I see now. Did this Danse say what are they looking for in the Commonwealth?”

“No, but when I mentioned that the Institute has access to teleportation, they got quite excited,” she admitted warily.

“No wonder. They don’t tolerate well when someone has more advanced technology than theirs. They have a firm idea what to do with technology. If they deem something worthy, they ‘preserve’ it; by collecting and guarding it. But if they condemn something dangerous, they will try to destroy it; by any means necessary,” he paused for a moment to sip from his beer before he continued, “I bet they think teleportation is the dangerous type.”

“Can’t argue with that,” Nick said. “The idea that they can come and go as they please ain’t comforting.”

Winter nodded silently and fidgeted with her glass, as she contemplated what Mac said.

“How do you know all this?” she asked curiously.

“They are everywhere in the Capital Wasteland, you can’t go anywhere without running into one of their patrols or checkpoints. But most of these details a friend told me.”

“A friend?” Nick and Winter asked in unison, both chuckling after it.

“Caitlin, a dweller from Vault 101. We met eleven years ago, when she wanted to reach Vault 87, which was only accessible from Little Lamplight. She joined the Brotherhood and aided their cause quite much. She later tried to convince me to join, but I’m not a fanatic and I don’t understand how can she stand them, either. Though, I have to admit, their rise in power made the Capital Wasteland a little safer. They made purified water available to everyone, again, thanks to Caitlin and her father. 

“Only that the last few years the leadership changed and so did some of their views. She said that the new Elder was trying to return to the original ideology. They became more xenophobe and less benevolent. Can’t say I liked their new policies, so I hitched a ride with a caravan and ended up here,” he said pensively, examining his empty bottle. “Another round?” he asked and stood up.

“Only a Nuka Cola, please. This,” she raised and playfully tilted her glass a few times, “was more than enough. My liver is not like it used to be.”

“You talk?” Nick asked sardonically. “What I wouldn’t give for a nice glass of wine sometimes, but it would just rust me if I tried.”

Winter tried not to laugh out loud, but she already felt the alcohol percentage in her bloodstream and couldn’t stop herself. She just laughed and laughed for long minutes. Meantime Mac returned with the drinks and quietly observed her gaiety, eliciting more of it with his amused expression. When her laughter subsided a few minutes later, she wiped the tears with the side of her fists and downed the third of the Nuka before she realized it wasn’t a regular one. “Cherry, nice,” she stated curtly, “thanks.” She nodded approvingly that Mac remembered when she mentioned a few weeks ago she liked this variant better.

“I aim to please,” he replied with a slight blush, what Winter didn’t notice in the dimness. For some reason, Nick Valentine smiled to himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you are reading it, it means you read through everything I've written so far for this fic, even though you possibly knew I'll change some things. If so, **please, know that you have my eternal gratitute** and please, **give me your thoughts** on, well, anything! I don't have much time to work on this fic, but I plan it meticulously, and I promise it'll continue. I don't when, but it will. 
> 
> Until then, you can visit my tumblr for more Winter content, if you wish.

**Author's Note:**

> Around June 2017 I started a thought-experience, and here's the first fruit of it.  
> What to expect? Major game spoilers, lots of Brotherhood of Steel, lots of awkward moments, some Minuteman activity, necessary amount of Railroad and a lot about the Sole Survivors pre-war life.
> 
> Please, suggest new tags or correct my existing ones if needed.
> 
> I also post this to deviantArt, with some illustrations as well. See my [gallery here](http://lothrilzul.deviantart.com/gallery/63665791/Nuclear-Winter).  
> 


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